Minerva Cuevas - Aernout Mik - Mladen Stilinovic :: January 26 – May 4, 2008 :: Van Abbemuseum, Bilderdijklaan 10, Eindhoven, The Netherlands.

This trio sets each in dialogue with another, providing points of comparison and difference. Each of the artists in this presentation relate to the artistic traditions of realism, drawing on small everyday realities and histories to tell stories about economy, perception and survival. The starting point of Minerva Cuevas’ work is social intervention in spaces ranging from the Internet’s virtual space to urban locations and museums. The exhibition is therefore a place where her interventions are not only presented, but also take place. The visitor is a spectator but inevitably also a participant. Cuevas’ solo exhibition will address how we perceive and understand things; she brings ‘certain phenomena’ forth in her installation, using customized antique optical devices, such as a projecting microscope and slide projectors, combined with modern fibre glass light projectors. By including the outmoded techniques of observation as parts of her exhibition, the artist enables us to see how ways of seeing have been constituted as social phenomena.

Aernout Mik presents a part of the multichannel video installation that was received with great enthusiasm at the 52nd Venice Biennale. It consists of two works – Training Ground, 2007 and Convergencies, 2007. Training Ground is a fictional work in which Mik starts from the idea of a ‘training’ or ‘exercise’, asking how we prepare teams of first responders (policemen, fire brigades, medical teams, etc.) – and ourselves – to deal with potential future crises or threats to national security or handle issues such as (illegal) immigration. Convergencies employs both documentary footage of training and footage from real situations in which the acquired techniques and strategies are applied. On one hand Mik asks, aren’t we all actually subjected in the same way to this rather disquieting reality? Concurrently, he clarifies the notion of the ‘subject’ as one who is capable of acting in order to overcome the distinction between subjection and possible liberation, metaphorically suggesting that perhaps it is from here that new opportunities might

Mladen Stilinović’s work consists of installations, collages, photographs, artist books and actions as well as work made with artists collectives. He has been exhibiting since 1975 and recently showed to great success at Documenta 12. He researches the interactions between visual and verbal signs and intervenes on inexpensive and found material. The exhibition will pivot around the issues of economy and media. It will show a selection from Stilinović’s personal production of over 70 artist books, dating from the 1970s to today and a number of large scale installations that deal with every day reality in former Yugoslavia and today’s Croatia. Combining photography with ceramics and embroidery, these often fragile works speak about hidden histories and unrealised possibilities from the socialist past and the capitalist present.