ABOUT THE FAIR
Galerie Ron Mandos is excited to be part of the 2022 edition of Unseen at the Westergas in Amsterdam, taking place from September 15 to September 18, 2022. This yearâs presentation includes a selection of works by Erwin Olaf, Mohau Modisakeng, Gilleam Trapenberg, Sander Coers and Kwadwo Amfo. You can find us at booth 62.
Together with Harlan Levey Projects we will also show Sektor by Marcin Dudek as part of the Unbound Exhibition, an independent non-profit extension of Unseen, dedicated to exploring the expanding outer limits of the photographic universe on a monumental scale.
Practical Information:
Location:
Westergas
KlĂśnneplein 1
1014 DD Amsterdam
Opening Hours:
Friday 16 September: 11.00 â 21.00 uur
Saturday 17 September: 11.00 -19.00 uur
Sunday 18 September: 11.00 â 19.00 uur
Tickets
Online day ticket: ⏠19,50 p.p. Click here to book your ticket(s).
Erwin Olaf
Erwin Olaf (NL, 1959) explores the human experience through meticulously staged scenes. Dance in Close-Up: Hans van Manen seen by Erwin Olaf is a detailed series of dance poses captured on film – each of them exuding the singular language of Hans van Manenâs oeuvre. The photos show fragments of bodies, athletic motions, sculpted torsos, outstretched limbs and searching hands. Olaf brings us closer to the performers than any theatre. Yet, his photographs are not merely capsules – capturing danceâs inherent fluidity and motion: a perfectly balanced pirouette or dramatic leap through the air. Instead, Olaf captures danceâs kinetic opposite: stillness.
Mohau Modisakeng
Mohau Modisakeng (ZA, 1986) uses material, metaphor and the black body as tools to explore the influence of South Africaâs violent history that has been ignored in todayâs society. Zion (2018) deals with the relationship between body and place. The idea that all people are meant to belong somewhere, yet in reality there are millions of people in search of refuge, migrating across borders and landscapes for various reasons. In this work there is no obvious signifier of place except for a heap of coal being thrown on a table. The black rocks of fossilised material refer to the mineral wealth attached to a place, but they also refer to the absence of place as people flee from their homes due to the violence that follows the exploitation of these types of mineral resources. Modisakeng opens a new solo exhibition at the gallery in October 2022.
Gilleam Trapenberg
Gilleam Trapenberg (CW, 1991) reflects on the contradictions that are part of the social landscape in Curaçao, where the idea of a utopian paradise is diametrically opposed to the realities of post-colonialism and tourism. The series UnbĂŠ tâawerĂł is Trapenbergâs visual interpretation of the national identity of Curaçao, where he was born and raised. In his photographs, warm memories of his youth on the island are alternated with traces of the colonial past and subtle undertones of political misrule, but also individual pride and expressions of identity â more than ten years since Curaçao became an autonomous country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Sander Coers
Sander Coers (NL, 1997) is the winner of the RM Photo Talent Award of 2021. Recreating and rearranging memories, he reflects on his own stories as well as those of his friends and peers, often other young men. The series Blue Mood (Al Mar) is a tender portrait of a generation. In this exploration and celebration of adolescence, Coers revisits, recreates and rearranges the collected memories of his friends, contemporaries and himself within a colorful, warm and dreamlike world, a hallucinative landscape based on their stories on the vulnerability of growing up, the transformation to adulthood, the fragility of young masculinity and finding love and self-acceptance.
Kwadwo Amfo
For Kwadwo Amfo (GH, 1990), whose work is now part of the exhibition Best of Graduates 2022 at Galerie Ron Mandos, social commentary became the base of his work throughout the years. Ranging from societal beauty standards, identity politics, social inclusion and conformity, and topics on the self and the other. Amfo has expanded this into works that display representations of misrepresentations, stereotypes and struggles of people of colour. His series SILHOUETTE investigates these struggles and misrepresentations of black men that have permeated our public consciousness.