Martijn Hendriks
Martijn Hendriks’s (1973, NL), practice appears to pull in two opposite directions. On the one hand, it draws on the art historical legacies of abstraction and the highly concentrated formal vocabulary and reductive approach of minimalism, whilst it also brings these legacies into a process of continuous reconfiguration that explores their possibilities in relation to the permanently destabilised state of contemporary images and objects. It unfolds as a state in which value, meaning and context are constantly shifting. Recent exhibitions include ‘Autumn of Modernism’ at De Vleeshal, Middelburg (2012), ‘Memery’ at MASS MoCA, North Adams (2011), and ‘Free’ at the New Museum, New York (2010-2011).
12 Glowing Men | Netherlands 2008 | Digital video | 4 min
12 Glowing Men takes as its starting point the idea that there is something significant in the confrontation between two completely different, conflicting visual registers. The work consists of adding an overly spectacular abstract visual effect to the movie 12 Angry Men by Sidney Lumet (1957). The abstract effect would not seem to have anything to do with the discussion of ethics and morality in the film, but an uncertain yet unmistakable relation between the two forms of visuality nevertheless establishes itself.