Middle Gate

    NLEN

    The exhibition project Middle Gate II – The Story of Dymphna is a collaboration between M HKA (Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp) and the cultural centre de Werft in Geel. Middle Gate II is the follow up to the exhibition Middle Gate, curated by Jan Hoet in Geel in 2013. The exhibition concept is closely tied to the legend of the holy Dymphna, saint of the possessed, the mentally ill and patroness against epilepsy and insanity. The legend of Dymphna shares a strong connection to the identity of Geel, "the charitable city".

    Sergey Bratkov / Сергій Братков

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    ©Sergey Bratkov
    Pilots and stewardesses, 2003
    Sergey Bratkov / Сергій Братков
    Photography , 7 x (40 x 30 cm)
    photo on aluminium

    The narrative tradition of a specifically Russian heroism is the central pictorial or scenographic motif in the series Pilots and Stewardesses. The series consists of seven pictures of children, with the boys dressed up as pilots and the girls dressed up as stewardesses, giving them the appearance of adults, depicted as heroes. The series comments on the influence of the mass media on the perception of the individual through advertisement, kitsch, beauty pageants and Hollywood movies. Children tend to mimic the constructed, 'perfect' world that is suggested by advertising. Bratkov shows the irony and absurdity of this act of mimicry.

     

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