Beyond Abstraction – More than you see

What can be discovered on the other side of the abstraction? No simple answer because abstraction describes the process that filters out the general and conceptual from the concrete discernible and representational or removes the important from the unimportant. The three artists from the Netherlands, Simsa Cho, Menno Jonker and Winnie Teschmacher, confront themselves with this task. What you do not see, they interpret with brilliant works in a completely different manner. Despite high abstraction the themes of their works are discernible. They reveal to the observer sometimes playful, sometimes seriously and at all times satisfying the material.

Simsa Cho was born 1962 in Chiba, Japan. After taking his course at Tama Art University he moved to Amsterdam to the Rietveld Akademie. In the meantime, he has found his way beyond the big Dutch gallery circles. Poetic, sometimes romancing, Simsa Cho draws the artistic language from the rich source of the unconscious. His unconventional sculptures that he often combines with other materials tell mysterious stories, from time to time with humor and irony.

Menno Jonker, born 1968 in Castricum in the Netherlands, turned to glass as an artistic medium not until1997. Nonetheless, already in 2001 he was nominated as the best glass artists of the world by the Corning Museum of Glass (U.S.A). His works are appreciated due to their perfection, the unique shape language and the innovative dealing with the material glass. The organic, adaptable shapes of his objects encourage the observer to give way to his haptical tendencies and to feel the harmonic contours. This way they have a strong emotional force that underline the intensive, unusual shades of color. Menno Jonke’s artistic language acts lyrical and he thoroughly declares his support for the aesthetics of the glass.

Winnie Teschmacher, born 1958 in Rotterdam, can look back on a long-standing and widespread experience with the material glass. After studying at the Academy of the Fine Arts in Rotterdam and at the Free Academy in the Hague she opened her own glass studio already in 1983. As a freelance artist and designer she was active for several glass factories. In her artistic work she advances like a mystic to the core of the things. In the course of this works come into being from a clear, rational architecture the shape language of which congenially combines harmony, calmness and spirituality.

The Ernsting Stiftung is delighted to introduce these three unusual artists to you in the new exhibition „Beyond Abstraction“.

Photos:

Simsa Cho, Twilight Energy, 2002 – Photo Ron Zijlstra

Menno Jonker, Atlantic Ridge Crater, 2007 – Photo Jeroen van der Spek

Winnie Teschmacher, Equillibrium 1, 2006 – Photo AHH

Winnie Teschmacher, Light of the soul, 2007 – Photo Louis Sonderegger