29|06 – 30|08|2025 – Opening 29 June from 3 until 5 pm.
Deen van Meer regards the theatre stage as a landscape, and the landscape as a stage. This vision is the subject of the research he is conducting at Movement Exposed Gallery Space from 29 June onwards. How do the dance photographs he took over the past three decades relate to his landscape photographs? Are there visual parallels in terms of composition or the dramatic impact of an image? Over the course of a month, Van Meer further explores the relationship between the dance stage and the landscape. The photographs from the original Dance Scapes exhibition are gradually replaced by new images.
Photography in the theatre and in the landscape takes place under partly similar conditions. Light is a very decisive factor. In the theatre, a new but fixed lighting design is used for each performance. In the landscape, the light changes with the passing of time and changing weather conditions. In both situations, Van Meer has no influence on this. And whereas in the theatre he always operates from the darkness, from the wings or the auditorium, outside he often only takes out his camera when dusk sets in.
Another similar condition is that when capturing a dance performance, no direct contact with the performer, the subject, is possible. This also applies to photographing the landscape. And because a performance unfolds over time, just like a landscape that is constantly changing, it is impossible to repeat the same shot.
During the Dance Scapes exhibition at Movement Exposed Gallery Space, Deen van Meer places existing images side by side and searches for relationships and parallels in which light plays a special role.
Impression of the exhibition
1. Triptych: Salka Ardal Rosengren in Drumming, choreography Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker, 2010 & The Historic Grand Canyon Hotel, 2019 & Windmill, 2019 | Megumi Nakamura, Wijk aan Zee, 1992 | Duo: Joshua Tree, 2019 & Anna Seidl in Shostakovich Chamber Symphony, choreography Krzysztof Pastor for Het Nationale Ballet, 1992
2. Heather Ware inSmell of Bliss, choreography LeineRoebana, 2012 | Reut Gez-Wang in Next 2, choreography LeineRoebana, 2012
3. Collage: Dead tree, Yellowstone National Park, 2019 | Jeanette Vondersaar, rehearsal Présages, Het Nationale Ballet, 1993 | Jeanette Vondersaar, Little Colorado, Provence, 1997 | Ty Boomershine in Sporen, choreography LeineRoebana, 2003
4. Marieke Simons, Wijk aan Zee, 1992
5. Dancer (basement): Nathalie Caris
6. Light box: Heather Ware, Luana van Eekeren, Uri Eugenio in Snow in June, choreography LeineRoebana, 2015 | projected image: Beach at Santa Monica Pier, 2019