Ane Graff: The Wound in Its Entanglements

Presented here is the first solo exhibition of Norwegian artist Ane Graff in the Netherlands. Over the past decade, she has created sculptural installations that question how ideas of human exceptionalism relate to the health and ecological disasters we face today. More recently, Graff has begun to extend her research into mental health, examining the environmental risk factors and environments that influence mental states, and the socioeconomic and physical environments shaping mental distress. Her solo exhibition pairs this more recent inquiry with earlier bodies of work, which explores related notions of inflammation, correlating the human body with the social and environmental injustices typifying our present.

As part of her artistic research, Graff investigates materials, situations, and historical events that have created bodily changes, even ‘epigenetic changes.’ Namely, changes that affect the way genes work in response to environmental and behavioral factors. Her interest in the materiality of bodies has led her to identify ingredients that have, in one way or another, been linked to the chronic diseases of our times. Ranging from radioactive molecules originating from Chernobyl, to glacial till-clay deposits, road dust, and artificial flavoring found in Skittles candies, to name a few. These she derives from present-day sites and substances, as well as historical landmarks dating back to Paleolithic times.

The artist regards her artworks as bodies in themselves, sites of discovery where entangled narratives and materials meet, change, and grow together, both conceptually and materially. Akin to the body, each artwork—comprising, in some cases, up to 50 ingredients—is engaged in ongoing processes of interaction, gradually shifting in composition material make-up, and appearance over time.