Nick van Woert: If I Wrote a Poem

GRIMM is pleased to announce If I Wrote a Poem, a solo exhibition of new sculptures by Nick van Woert at our Amsterdam Keizersgracht gallery. This is the artist’s fifth solo presentation with the gallery and his first solo presentation in the Netherlands since Violence at GEM, Museum for Contemporary Art, The Hague in 2016.

The title of the show, If I Wrote a Poem, refers to an earlier work called If I made a list of everything I touched in a day it would be a poem that could have never happened at any other time in history (2018). It is safe to presume that these new works are that list and that this poem is about the difficulty of trying to understand the genealogy of materials.

For van Woert, the materials we use are a direct reflection of who we are. He references the ancient Roman figure the Haruspex, who determine the health of a location by inspecting the dissected entrails of animals found in that location, and the French entertainer Michel Lotito (1950-2007), or ‘Monsieur Mangetout’ which translates to Mr. Eats All, who was famous for consuming everyday objects such as bicycles, a Cesna aircraft, and a coffin, to reinforce this idea. If Monsieur Mangetout was dissected by the Haruspex, his entrails would quite literally reflect his environment. What would the Haruspex interpret from his entrails? This thought begins to suggest that the figure and the landscape are interchangeable. You are what you eat.

Opening: Friday February 1st from 5-8 pm