Marinus Boezem (1934)
Netherlands
Biography :
"Marinus Boezem made his first artistic gesture in 1960, "exposing" a fragment of polder as if it were one of his works: he created a device allowing this panorama to be seen, and invited people to use it In 1963, "discovering air as purification, as reality, as the conquest of space", Boezem began to be interested in all the forms, objects and phenomena that can be associated with it, such as the wind or the breath of breathing. He thus signed a fan in 1965, then imagined environments, like tables whose white tablecloths were lifted by a fan. The fleeting nature of air led him to develop ephemeral artistic forms, to work on the question of the dematerialization of the work. In 1969, he signed the sky, using the gases released by a plane to write a name – his own – which disappeared as quickly as it was drawn. Boezem is then considered the one of the main representatives of the conceptual art and Arte Povera movements in the Netherlands, alongside Jan Dibbets and Ger van Elk. His actions are as ephemeral as they are light and testify to a strange power of man over natural elements. Fascinated by the myths of Orpheus and Icarus, the artist questions man's relationship with these fundamental natural elements, through the creation of complex environments integrating air, light, sound - even human (L’uomoflye, 1979, performance). In 1978, Boezem imagined a grandiose project, a green Cathedral erected in nature using concrete paving and 178 Italian poplars; it will be completed in 1987. Expected to fall into ruin, to lose its natural pillars, the green cathedral will nevertheless remain visible through its paving, ground plan. Gradually reintegrating durable and almost eternal materials into his works, such as granite, Boezem questions man's point of view in the face of nature, an artificial, recreated nature.
Born in the Netherlands, Marinus Boezem participated in the Inflatable Structures exhibition at the Musée d'art moderne de la Ville de Paris in 1968, presenting two Air-Sculptures and an Air-Structure, and took part in the exhibition When Attitudes become forms (1969) at the Kunsthalle in Bern. Among his latest solo exhibitions is A volo d'ucello in Middelburg in Holland (2010)." (Source, website, Frac Centre-Val de Loire)
"Marinus Boezem (1934, the Netherlands) belongs, together with Jan Dibbets and Ger van Elk, among the most important representatives of the Conceptual Art and Arte Povera movement in The Netherlands. In the 1960s, Boezem discovered that he could use elusive elements such as air, weather, wind and light as visual materials and made a name with radical, immaterial works that were far ahead of their time. Boezem was one of the initiators of the ground-breaking exhibition ‘Op Losse Schroeven: Situaties en Cryptostructuren’ (1969) at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and took part in the equally influential exhibition ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ at the Kunsthalle Bern in the same year.
In 1969 he created one of his most famous works of art, ‘Signing the Sky Above The Port of Amsterdam With an Aeroplane, 1969’: exactly as stated in its title, an aircraft’s condensation trails were used to spell out Boezem’s surname in the sky, the ephemeral wording disappearing almost as soon as it was created. In 1971 he made an artwork for television that was broadcast under the auspices of Gerry Shum's legendary Fernseh Gallery. Furthermore, Boezem created numerous works in public space and land art. The Green Cathedral is a beautiful example: 174 Italian poplar trees are planted to reproduce the floor plan and measurements of the Cathedral at Reims, in a flat polder near Almere, the Netherlands.
In an oeuvre spanning more than sixty years, Marinus Boezem has created a body of work that stands quite independently in contemporary art. His works are part of many important museum collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam; Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Gemeentemuseum Den Haag; Museum Kröller-Muller, Otterloo; Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar; and many more public art collections." (Source, website, Upstream Gallery)
Works :
- Sand Fountain (1969)
- Het Beademenvan de Beeldbuis (1971)