2022 Juggle Struggle
Juggle Struggle, Ontsteking Gent (BE), 2.12 – 18.12.22
In recent years, Guns explored the possibilities of the photobook. For this exhibition she built a scenography in the form of a maze as a physical translation of a photobook. Through peeping holes and other interventions, the exhibition presents itself as a page turner with surprises around every corner. The audience in the exhibition becomes an active viewer or voyeurist by looking for details and larger wholes.
The works in JUGGLE STRUGGLE are a sample of Guns' oeuvre from the last 5 years. There is a fascination for the experiments from the pre-cinema period, but also for protest culture, the world of the fair and the circus. Guns juggles these themes and blends them seamlessly through recurring motifs such as the ball, the circle, movement and manipulation of time. The magic of the circus is linked to the experiments from pre-cinema, which emerged at the same time as the heyday of circuses and amusement parks. They also tried to make the unknown and impossible tangible by setting things in motion. Think of the kissing ladies of pre-cinema pioneer Eadweard Muybridge, the movements of the juggler or the leaps of the lion.
Guns subtly frames the art world as a circus, this exhibition as a kind of fair and the artist as a prophetic clown or ringmaster. For example, there is a vending machine that contains balls with works by artist friends.
Every performance comes to an end, or as Charles Bukowski once said: “We're all going to die, all of us, what a circus!” But so far, Guns invites us to be amazed and experience a magical moment, to be enchanted by beauty that makes you think and dream.
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