Ola Vasiljeva
The Dong With A Luminous Nose
Galerie Fons Welters - Front Space
9 Sep – 21 Oct 2017
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Stepping into an exhibition by Ola Vasiljeva feels like becoming part of a short story, entering in the midst of it. The Dong with a Luminous Nose introduces an environment filled with objects and structures as clues of overlapping narratives.
The Dong with a Luminous Nose borrows its title from a nonsense song by Edward Lear (1871). The song depicts the heartbroken Dong, who is left behind at a beach, longing for his ‘Jumbly Girl’. He designs a device to communicate his loss: “ the luminous nose”. Just as this nonsense rhyme, Vasiljeva touches up on subjects as grief, madness, eros, dismemberment and fragmentation.
In her installations Vasiljeva plays with the absence of hierarchy, not preferring one perspective or point of view over the other. The time space within Vasiljeva’s exhibitions is irrelevant, there is no beginning or end; cartoonish, puzzled, absurd and burlesque characters are present, but do not lead the story through a narrative. The visitor is the protagonist.
About the artist:
Ola Vasiljeva (1981) lives and works in The Hague. She graduated from HKU and Rijksakademie voor beeldende kunsten, Amsterdam. In 2013 she was a finalist of Prix de Rome. The recent solo exhibitions include: Gold Is the Metal With the Broadest Shoulders, Supportico Lopez, Berlin, 2017; Zefiro Torna, Passarelle CAC, Brest, 2017; You've got beautiful stairs, you know, Kunstverein München, Munich, 2016; Coeurtregetour, Galerie Antoine Levi, Paris, 2016; En Rachâchant, Vleeshal Markt, Middelburg, 2015; The Limp of A Letter, BOZAR, Brussels, 2015; University, Galerie Antoine Levi, Paris, 2015; Jargot, Art in General, New York, 2014; The Limp of A Letter, Prix de Rome, De Appel, Amsterdam, 2013; Cinq à sept, kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga, 2013. Her work also featured in several group exhibitions, including Carpet for a Lord, Supportico Lopez, Berlin, 2016; XII Baltic Triennial, CAC, Vilnius, 2015; Last Seen Entering the Biltmore, South London Gallery, London, 2014; What Were You Expecting, Mr. Milquetoast, a Plot?, Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe, 2014; Fusiform Gyrus, Lisson Gallery, London, 2013. She has an upcoming solo exhibition at the Grazer Kunstverein. Vasiljeva's work is part of the collections of CNAP, France; FRAC des Pays de Loire and Vleeshal, Middelburg among others.
Vasiljeva is the founder of OAOA (The Oceans Academy of Art), a hybrid art collectitive which functions as a platform for ideas about art, culture and the representation thereof.