For more than six decades, Liliane Lijn (born 1939, New York City, USA) has been working at the interface between visual art, literature and scientific thought. She has created an extensive body of work that includes sculptures, site-specific installations, paintings and moving images. Her work shows an affinity with surrealist ideas, ancient mythologies and feminist, scientific and linguistic thinking. One focus of Lijn's work is the question of how the invisible can be made visible, using the latest materials and experimenting with reflection, movement and light. As she explains, she wants to "see the world in the form of light and energy". She explores invisibility by using the visualization of electronic waves, forces, vibrations, light and sound. "I wanted people to see the sound," says Lijn.
The exhibition at Haus der Kunst is the first institutional solo exhibition of this scale in which Liliane Lijn presents her paintings, drawings, sculptures, films and installations. The exhibition focuses on her sculptural works from the 1980s as well as an overview of her oeuvre with works from the late 1950s to the present day. Influenced by the second wave of feminism and her own experiences as a woman, Lijn increasingly focuses on the human form and the female body. In her sculptures from the 1980s, Lijn presents futuristic and feminine archetypes that are part machine, part animal and part plant, made of soft feather dusters, synthetic fibers and industrial materials such as piano wire, steel and optical glass prisms. These works reflect her ongoing exploration of a new, feminine form.
The exhibition has been developed in collaboration with the mumok - Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien. In conjunction with the exhibition, a monograph on Liliane Lijn will be published in collaboration with mumok.
Curated by Emma Enderby with Teresa Retzer.
