Open Studio Celine Vahsen

ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE

07/09/2021

Fondation CAB is pleased to introduce Céline Vahsen (b. 1987, Malmedy, Belgium) as our 14th artist-in-residence.

Vahsen creates abstract works using manual processes. Each piece is built up over a long period of time, including canvases that she weaves herself.
Seen up close, the resulting images reveal subtle rhythms, patterns anchored in the fundamental structure of the fabric itself, which she obtains by dyeing yarns before weaving.
She doesn’t decide on the final motif in advance: she allows for randomness in the emergence of rhythms in the process of creating the canvas.
The idea is to observe the metamorphosis of threads into a structure, and their transformation into an unpredictable image via an aleatory approach.
Blurry or visual monochrome impressions appear as she interacts with visual perception. Usually the resulting image is presented frontally, the moiré effects are stretched on a frame like a screen, making it possible to view the colors in vibration. The construction of the image represents the mathematical beginning and the technical progress of society, which was partially engendered by looms.
The weaving process itself incorporates the notion of linear progressivity; it is created with gestures in constant movement over time, and through the unfolding of the fabric by causality. The final composition consists of fabric fragments which visualize temporality. They manifest themselves and communicate a feeling of change through colors, symmetry or asymmetry, etc. in the image.
Vahsen uses ancestral methods of hybrid cultures, integrating and modifying them through experimentation in a personal approach. She arrives at new compositions of colors and patterns that hijack traditional results, while preserving traces of them.
The structure is made of such natural materials as silk, wool, linen or copper, transmitting the ethereal finesse of texture and tones through the image.
The starting point of the residency at Fondation CAB will be the fundamental plain weaving structures used by many cultures for utility objects or habitats.
This research reflects permanent change and stages of temporary stability, using evolving materials of natural origin.
They are part of a desire for sustainability; an effort that reflects the cycles of nature.
By using polymorph materials which are able to merge or transform through ageing, forms with a materialistic haptic emerge with this primordial structure.
The peculiarity of the medium of weaving is the essential crossing of threads, without which textile would not exist.
An installation of soft coloured overlapping panels made of tangible materials will be transfigured by light, environment and linear time.

Celine Vahsen will be staying with us till end of July 2021.
Please get in touch with Evelyn Simons at evelyn@fondationcab.com should you be interested in a studio visit with the artist.

OPEN STUDIO during the Brussels Gallery Weekend from Tuesday September 7 to Sunday September 12 from 12 p.m. to 6 p.m.