À Rebours
May 16th - May 30 2015
OK Corral

In Huysmans's novel À Rebours from 1884, the protagonist Jean Des Esseintes decides to cut himself off from the world, retreat into his house and not deal with anything other than the aesthetic pleasures he prefer. In his retreat, he composes his very own reading of the history of art and literature.

During the past months, Johannes Sivertsen attempted to put himself through an analogue process. Disillusioned about art's potential for action in the political space, he retreated into the medium of oil paint, and decided to make a series of depictions of his interior, where the esthetic judgment would be the only line guiding the choices within the execution of the works.

But these choices lead to a paradox. Being isolated with visual art means a confrontation with the questions of how one sees, and how ones gaze has been shaped by culture, medias and images. How could it then at all be possible, to exclude the outside world?