Els Martens work is about the embodied act of looking at the landscape and transferring that embodied experience through the medium of photography and photobooks. Central to her work is the (re)construction of a complex, layered spatiotemporal fabric and the dismantling of the linearity of both time and space, referring to the ever changing state of things, and our perception of it.
Inspired by more isolated ways of living among nature, she repeatedly returns to the same places, mostly up North, to explore the landscape as a physical, mental and social place. By revisiting these places, she also revisits the things she sees, while continuing to look for and discover new elements. Working with a 50-mm lens, the artist consciously chooses a technology that is believed to imitate natural vision the closest. She largely abandons the linear perspective, which organises pictorial perception according to an objective grid. In stead, she prefers, a more subjective-affective approach, involving the use of atmospheric perspective, full-bleed images, close-ups, and image distortions.
The photobook medium, as a vessel for experience, introduces yet another layer to her work: the pacing of the book and its unique potential to activate photography. The turning of the page and the turning of the gaze essentially mobilise the image. Rhythmically, there’s a close and at the same time disturbing harmony in her books between the sequence of the image and that of the page, while the artist is balancing the tension between a still and moving image, gently switching between orientation and disorientation, between a slow-paced repetitive rhythm and a fragmented one, slowing down and speeding up, moving forward and backwards, zooming in and out.
CONTACT: elselsmartens@gmail.com
INSTAGRAM
BIO
born in 1978, Eeklo, Belgium
Living in L’écluse (Beauvechain), Belgium
EDUCATION:
Art teacher, Royal Academy of Fine Arts(KASK), Gent, Belgium, 2004
Master of arts: ceramics, Sint Lucas, Gent, Belgium, 2000
second major: photography
Erasmus: University of Arts and Design Helsinki, Finland, 1999
CV
2022
Stek & book dummy at book Stefan Vanthuyne: Moving through the Space of the Picture and the Page. The Photobook as an Artistic and Architectural Medium.
Essays on six contemporary Belgian photobook makers and the way they deal with space, time, movement and surface within the book and within the photographic image. The artists discussed are Tine Guns, Dirk Braeckman, Els Martens, Max Pinckers, Vincent Delbrouck and Aglaia Konrad.
06/11/2021 – 06/11/2022
Book Stek at display, expo Known and Strange: Photographs from the Collection, Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), London, Great Britain, curator: Lisa Springer
https://www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/known-and-strange-photographs-from-the-collection
24/04 – 06/06/2021
Book Stek at expo Bioscopic books, a collaboration between LUCA School of Arts, Kunsthal Gent & Art Cinema OFFoff, concept: Tine Guns, Inge Ketelers & Isolde Vanhee, KUNSTHAL Gent, Belgium
https://kunsthal.gent/tentoonstellingen/bioscopic-books
19/04 – 25/04/2021
Stek at Notes on a confinement, exhibition as a forum for conversations about the concept of confinement, The Gallery at De Montfort University, Leicester, Great Britain, curator: Mary O’Neill
04/08 – 08/08/2020
Masterclass Geert Goiris, mentormentor, Nucleo, Blanco Gent
07/12 – 15/12/2019:
presentation new photobookdummy expo VERZAMELD WERK, mentormentor, BLANCO, NUCLEO, Gent , Belgium
NOV - DEC 2019:
Book Stek, essay (in Dutch) van Arjen Mulder: De volledige blik. Over Awoiska van der Molen & Els Martens, DE WITTE RAAF nr 202, november – december 2019
https://www.dewitteraaf.be/artikel/de-volledige-blik/
27/05 – 06/10/2019:
Book Stek at expo Photobook Belge, section Recent Publications, FOMU, Photo Museum Antwerpen , Belgium, curator: Tamara Berghmans
https://fomu.be/expos/photobook-belge
JULY 2019:
Book Stek at online publications, Landscape Stories Magazine , social media, Italy
07/12 – 16/12/2018:
Stek at expo TRAJECT 02, mentormentor, Blanco @ Nucleo, Gent, Belgium
2018:
Publication artist book Stek, Art Paper Editions, text Touching ground by Stefan Vanthuyne
28/3 – 30/05/2018:
Propositions d’artistes, expo Stek, Contretype, centre pour la photographie contemporaine, Brussel, Belgium
www.contretype.org
2017 – 2018:
Traject 02 mentormentor, Gent, Belgium
Inspired by more isolated ways of living among nature, she repeatedly returns to the same places, mostly up North, to explore the landscape as a physical, mental and social place. By revisiting these places, she also revisits the things she sees, while continuing to look for and discover new elements. Working with a 50-mm lens, the artist consciously chooses a technology that is believed to imitate natural vision the closest. She largely abandons the linear perspective, which organises pictorial perception according to an objective grid. In stead, she prefers, a more subjective-affective approach, involving the use of atmospheric perspective, full-bleed images, close-ups, and image distortions.
The photobook medium, as a vessel for experience, introduces yet another layer to her work: the pacing of the book and its unique potential to activate photography. The turning of the page and the turning of the gaze essentially mobilise the image. Rhythmically, there’s a close and at the same time disturbing harmony in her books between the sequence of the image and that of the page, while the artist is balancing the tension between a still and moving image, gently switching between orientation and disorientation, between a slow-paced repetitive rhythm and a fragmented one, slowing down and speeding up, moving forward and backwards, zooming in and out.
CONTACT: elselsmartens@gmail.com
BIO
born in 1978, Eeklo, Belgium
Living in L’écluse (Beauvechain), Belgium
EDUCATION:
Art teacher, Royal Academy of Fine Arts(KASK), Gent, Belgium, 2004
Master of arts: ceramics, Sint Lucas, Gent, Belgium, 2000
second major: photography
Erasmus: University of Arts and Design Helsinki, Finland, 1999
CV
2022
Stek & book dummy at book Stefan Vanthuyne: Moving through the Space of the Picture and the Page. The Photobook as an Artistic and Architectural Medium.
Essays on six contemporary Belgian photobook makers and the way they deal with space, time, movement and surface within the book and within the photographic image. The artists discussed are Tine Guns, Dirk Braeckman, Els Martens, Max Pinckers, Vincent Delbrouck and Aglaia Konrad.
06/11/2021 – 06/11/2022
Book Stek at display, expo Known and Strange: Photographs from the Collection, Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), London, Great Britain, curator: Lisa Springer
https://www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/known-and-strange-photographs-from-the-collection
24/04 – 06/06/2021
Book Stek at expo Bioscopic books, a collaboration between LUCA School of Arts, Kunsthal Gent & Art Cinema OFFoff, concept: Tine Guns, Inge Ketelers & Isolde Vanhee, KUNSTHAL Gent, Belgium
https://kunsthal.gent/tentoonstellingen/bioscopic-books
19/04 – 25/04/2021
Stek at Notes on a confinement, exhibition as a forum for conversations about the concept of confinement, The Gallery at De Montfort University, Leicester, Great Britain, curator: Mary O’Neill
04/08 – 08/08/2020
Masterclass Geert Goiris, mentormentor, Nucleo, Blanco Gent
07/12 – 15/12/2019:
presentation new photobookdummy expo VERZAMELD WERK, mentormentor, BLANCO, NUCLEO, Gent , Belgium
NOV - DEC 2019:
Book Stek, essay (in Dutch) van Arjen Mulder: De volledige blik. Over Awoiska van der Molen & Els Martens, DE WITTE RAAF nr 202, november – december 2019
https://www.dewitteraaf.be/artikel/de-volledige-blik/
27/05 – 06/10/2019:
Book Stek at expo Photobook Belge, section Recent Publications, FOMU, Photo Museum Antwerpen , Belgium, curator: Tamara Berghmans
https://fomu.be/expos/photobook-belge
JULY 2019:
Book Stek at online publications, Landscape Stories Magazine , social media, Italy
07/12 – 16/12/2018:
Stek at expo TRAJECT 02, mentormentor, Blanco @ Nucleo, Gent, Belgium
2018:
Publication artist book Stek, Art Paper Editions, text Touching ground by Stefan Vanthuyne
28/3 – 30/05/2018:
Propositions d’artistes, expo Stek, Contretype, centre pour la photographie contemporaine, Brussel, Belgium
www.contretype.org
2017 – 2018:
Traject 02 mentormentor, Gent, Belgium