THE BAKERY
MARIA BARNAS
We are turning corners
April 21 – June 16, 2018
Sputter fiction
We are turning corners
We are turning limbs
We are turning into fiction
As we speak
Annet Gelink Gallery is proud to present We are turning corners, the third solo exhibition of Maria Barnas with the gallery.
Visual artist, poet and writer Maria Barnas focuses her work on the power of language in shaping reality. Her long-term research on whether words can be trusted as carriers of anything solid, converges in Sputter Fiction: presented first at the Nationaal Glasmuseum in Leerdam, the group of glass objects now on show in The Bakery further investigates the capacity of words to create new images. Does language consist of images? Can you pronounce a shape? Barnas builds narratives and alternative histories around history-as-we-know-it and what is presented as factual. An image, like a text, is not a closed container. It rarely depicts or describes what it sets out to. She works against the notion that language should have a specific form, aware of the fact that our grasp of reality is closely linked to the words we (don't) choose to describe. Her work delves into the power structures that language exudes on a day-to-day, art-historical and political level. Moreover, her work sits at the heart of poetry's ability to both heighten and obscure our notion of reality.
Maria Barnas (NL, 1973) studied at the Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam and was resident at the Rijksakademie, Amsterdam and had several other residencies in Rome, Brasil and Paris. In 2015 Barnas won the Elisabeth van Thuringen Project prize, in 2008 she was awarded the Cees Buddingh’ Prize for her first collection of poetry 'Twee Zonnen' (2003) and 'Jaja de oerknal' (2013) was awarded with the Anna Bijn prize in 2014. Her solo exhibitions include the Nationaal Glasmuseum Leerdam (2017-18), Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam (2016), De Hallen Haarlem (2017), MAMAM, Recife (2011). She also had several group exhibitions such as: Cobra Museum (2017), De Appel Arts Centre (2016), Van Gogh Museum (2015), Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht (2014), Meinblau, Berlin (2014), Castrum Peregrini, Amsterdam (2013), Witte de With, Rotterdam (2013), Nederlands Uitvaartmuseum, Amsterdam (2012).