MONIKA BEHRENS
’THE HUNTING TROPHY’
4 FEBRUARY – 27 FEBRUARY, 2016
Unbreakable, 2013, Inkjet prints on archival cotton rag paper, 29.7 x 21 cm. Edition of three plus two artist proofs. Photography by Document Photography.
ID: There is three light brown wooden frames hung spaced across a white wall. In each frame there is a white piece of paper.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Within this work, Monika Behrens closely researched 17th century Dutch Still life painting. Behrens proposes that each sub-genre of the tradition contains a modality exclusive to their style – beyond the narrative and semiotic readings and beyond the general aesthetic values that are conventionally ascribed to the painting genre. Her exhibition at Verge focuses on the subgenre of Hunting Trophies. Behrens has found that the relationships between objects in Hunting Trophies involve an orgy of texture friction. To reconstruct the subgenre Behrens employed materials that comprehend its modality, in this case; tangled synthetic fur, sea creatures, jelly cups, golden guns and bananas are used to comprise the texture friction. The final paintings appear more as constructed painted monsters than still life paintings.
Monica Behrens, The Hunting Trophy, 2016. Installation View. Photography by Document Photography.
ID: There are two white walls in a cemented space. On the left there’s an angled wall with a large abstract painting hung on it. The painting has two large geese-like figures on it, with blue, black and grey abstract shapes behind it. On the right wall is another two large abstract paintings, the first one with a triangular yellow image in the middle with floating white forms and red strawberries on a black and grey background. The other with a large geese in the middle, upside down, with green and yellow glowing sticks and jelly like forms surrounding it, on a black and blue abstract background.
Monica Behrens, The Hunting Trophy, 2016. Installation View. Photography by Document Photography.
ID: There are three white walls in a cemented space. On the first angled wall, there is a large vertical painting with a female like figure in the middle of the painting, with long blonde hair, a pink top, white skirt and yellow material wrapped around her, with a background of black and white vertical squiggly lines. On the second wall there’s one vertical large painting, with a black mystical forest backdrop and a zebra print form in the middle of the work, with pink and yellow draped over it. On the third wall, there are two horizontal large paintings, one with a zebra print floor and pink mountain with an assemblage of colourful objects in the centre. The last painting has a zebra head in the middle facing the audience, with a pink fabric coming from its mouth. Behind the zebra head is a blue fabric draped on its shoulder and a black background.