MUSEUM ACQUISITION – NATIONAL GALLERY OF VICTORIA: CECILIE BENDIXEN
Cecilie Bendixen’s monumental textile installation Cloud Formations was recently acquired by the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. Commissioned for the NGV Triennial 2020, Cloud Formations is presented in dialogue with paintings by John Constable and J.M.W. Turner, among others, from the NGV’s permanent collection, on view until April 18th, 2021. Bringing together over 100 artists, designers and collectives from 33 countries, the NGV Triennial surveys the world of art and design, across cultures, scales, geographies and perspectives. Cecilie Bendixen is joined by leading international artists such as Alicja Kwade, Cerith Wyn Evans, Jeff Koons, Lee Ufan, Jim Shaw and Kengo Kuma.
INSTALLATION VIEWS | NGV TRIENNIAL 2020
Installation view of Cecilie Bendixen’s work Cloud formations collection 2020 on display in NGV Triennial 2020 from 19 December 2020 – 18 April 2021 at NGV International, Melbourne © Cecilie Bendixen/Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Maria Wettergren. Photo: Tom Ross
Installation view of Cecilie Bendixen’s work Cloud formations collection 2020 (foreground) and Jim Shaw’s work Capitol viscera appliances mural 2011 (background) on display in NGV Triennial 2020 from 19 December 2020 – 18 April 2021 at NGV International, Melbourne © Cecilie Bendixen/ Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Maria Wettergren © Jim Shaw / Courtesy of the artist and Simon Lee Gallery. Photo: Tom Ross
Cloud Formations is both an investigation and an expression of the fluid and fleeting beauty found in the roiling confluence of heat, light, moisture, particles and airflow that come together momentarily to make a cloud. Bendixen’s practice is grounded in the observation and expression of the intangible dynamics that are essential to our natural world, yet due to their ubiquity often go unnoticed.
Bendixen’s painstaking process involves a team of makers hand forming each piece with needle and thread over several months. The material qualities of the textile – texture, stiffness, translucency – are deftly worked, folded and stitched to create forms that invite us to consider how we perceive transience and the space between the material and the immaterial so perfectly reflected in a cloud. As a result of Bendixen’s process and material selection, the type of transformations that come about with the passage of time are embedded in this collection. A stiff, flat textile becomes soft and voluminous, each stitch marks time and each fold contains space, light and shadow – always changing as the viewer moves about the work and forces of gravity gradually tug and pull at the form. Cloud Formations draws our attention to the beauty and joy that can be found in these passing moments; encouraging us to look more closely and listen more intensely to the countless wonders occurring in the world all around us, all the time.
BEHIND THE SCENES | THE MAKING OF CLOUD FORMATIONS
ABOUT CECILIE BENDIXEN
Danish artist, Cecilie Bendixen, was born in Copenhagen in 1975 and lives and works in Askov, South Jutland, Denmark. Bendixen graduated as an architect from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Architecture in 2005, followed by a PhD in 2013. Her practice blends architecture, craft, art, and science to explore and experiment with natural phenomena. Often made from textile and constructed by hand, Bendixen’s work takes the form of spatial installations that capture and express intangible dynamics, such as space, sound, light and wind. The interplay between materials, process, form and environment guides her poetic approach to design and making. Cecilie Bendixen has exhibited extensively internationally including at the World Biennial of Contemporary Textile Art, Madrid; Crafted Matter, Korea; Design Miami Basel and Charlottenborg Spring Exhibition, Copenhagen. She was nominated for the Nordic Textile Awards in 2017, and the same year she received the Bindesboell Medal. Her works are held in private and public collections, including the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Danish Art Foundation; and the Galila Barzilaï-Hollander Collection, Brussels.
