Ignasi Aballí, Sarah Bostwick, Seamus Farrell, Hreinn Fridfinnsson, Claudio Parmiggiani, Georges Rousse, Fabrice Samyn

ABSENS was the inaugural exhibition of the new space of the Meessen De Clercq gallery. This new space, devoted to contemporary art has the distinctive feature of being located in a building erected in 1911 by Brussels architect De Decker, commissioned by a doctor, and which later was occupied by a medical test laboratory. It was crucial to mark the transition of this place by exhibiting artists who were capable of thinking about its past and its future. Motivated by a concern to respect this location, seven contemporary artists, each of a different nationality, were asked to work in situ in order to comprehend this location as a place of the intimate being. This exhibition had to make sense through the dialogue between the work and the location. This project was drawn up gradually, and in a lengthy process of reflection. It appeared, a posteriori, that one common theme united the works: that of absence, which is what gave rise to the Latin name of the exhibition, ABSENS.

Work of Hreinn : Sanctuary, 1992-2008, cardboard box and color sheet, 81 x 61 x 43 cm