FONDATION D’ENTREPRISE HERMES | Anne Marie Laureys

Joël Riff’s second exhibition as curator at La Verrière conjures the invigorating breath of the wind. Everything comes alive in visual gusts, born of a vortex between the hands. The event – the first solo exhibition in Brussels by Belgian artist and ceramicist Anne Marie Laureys – shines an unprecedented spotlight on her work through associations with three other figures: Maude Maris, Amélie Lucas-Gary and Auguste Rodin. The featured items include pre-existing pieces, new objects and an exceptional, historic loan, as an assertion of Laureys’s sculptural dynamic, under the benevolent gaze of painting.

As part of the new series at La Verrière, the exhibition “takes its own time”, extending invitations over the long term, both within the gallery space and through the accompanying publications.

La bise is the North wind that blows across Europe, cold and clinical in its embrace (the word is an affectionate term for an “air kiss” in French), but invariably a harbinger of fine, warmer weather. In a post-Covid, post-contact world, la bise catches us in its bracing clasp.

Since the dawn of time, potters have breathed life into their clay, filling their forms with air, like lungs. Across the arts, creative gestures will things into existence, shaping and suffusing them with the breath of life. In ancient Greek, the demiurgos, or creator, is also literally the “maker” – a skilled artisan.

For more than four decades, Anne Marie Laureys has worked with clay on the wheel, creating forms that seem to hold their breath… while others eternally exhale.

La Verrière
Boulevard de Waterloo 50
1000 Brussels (Belgium)
Opening: Tuesday, May 16 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Exhibition from May 17 to July 29, 2023
Free admission from Tuesday to Saturday, noon to 6 p.m.

www.fondationdentreprisehermes.org

ph cover: Anne Marie Laureys, Boneless Desire Opus #3, 2022, grès émaillé, 50 x 40 x 45 cm, courtesy de l’artiste © Peter Claeys

FONDATION D’ENTREPRISE HERMES | Anne Marie Laureys