Holes, variations on a theme
For his contribution to the Kunstenfestival Watou 2023, Joris Vermassen starts from a very topical theme. Through the craters in a war landscape caused by shelling, he links the Great War with the current war in Ukraine. Vermassen observes that the bomb craters in both wars don’t differ much. In both cases they represent violence and unbearable suffering. His own grandfather was involved in WWI as a reservist. On 26 April 1915 he narrowly escaped death when several grenades hit in Veurnestraat in Poperinge.
As in several other projects Vermassen transforms the local and the personal into a universal story. He draws and paints a series of bomb craters and links them with as many stories. For this he uses pictures of craters from both WWI and the current Ukraine war. The interplay of images and words supersede the anecdotal and local, giving the bomb craters or holes in the landscape a broader, metaphorical meaning of disruption. The drawings, which are all painted in brown tones, contain no human figures while the background is deliberately vague.
The similar treatment has practically erased the images’ origin. They demonstrate how very much alike both conflicts are. The holes they leave behind are mental scars, metaphors for existential pain. In the accompanying stories, Vermassen translates them into situations where people actually are present and are confronted with various voids or injuries.
Showing his project in castle De Lovie has a symbolic meaning as the house was home to French and English army commanders during WWI. The drawings and paintings are explicitly presented in classic frames that fit the interior. As such Vermassen questions both the romantic landscape and the romantic myth of war that were lost together with WWI.
"Beklijvende schilderijen"
"Nog een leidmotief in Watou is natuurlijk de oorlog. (...) Diverse kunstwerken refereren eraan (...) vooral Gaten, de beklijvende schilderijen met bomkraters van Joris Vermassen. De indringende, bruingetinte taferelen van verweerde oorlogslandschappen trekken parallellen tussen de Eerste Wereldoorlog – waarin zijn grootvader ternauwernood aan de dood ontsnapte – en het huidige conflict in Oekraïne. Gehuld in klassieke lijsten verwart hun bizarre esthetiek."
"Deze editie van Watou grossiert niet in uitschieters, spectaculaire ingrepen of gepronk met grote namen. Eerder is er sprake van ingetogenheid (...) en een grotere inbedding in de plaatselijke gemeenschap."
"Metaforen voor oorlogsleed"
"Joris Vermassen legt de link tussen de Eerste Wereldoorlog en die in Oekraïne. In aardetinten tekent en schildert hij een reeks bomkraters van toen en nu. Er is geen zichtbaar onderscheid, allemaal zijn het littekens in het landschap en metaforen voor oorlogsleed."
"Het kunstenfestival behandelt zijn bezoeker respectvol en voorzichtig, alsof het rekening houdt met diens eigen blutsen en builen."
© Joris Vermassen