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Event: Aperture's Dutch Artists Reception and One-Day Exhibition
Witzenhausen Gallery
Elandsstraat 145, Amsterdam,
Netherlands
Thursday, November 29, 2007
8:00 p.m.
Witzenhausen Gallery in Amsterdam is host to an evening honoring Aperture's Dutch artists. Hans Eijkelboom, Teun Hocks, Hellen van Meene, Erwin Olaf, and Bert Teunissen will each have a selection of their work on display as well as their respective books, published by Aperture.
See photos of the event here.
News: World Photographic Academy
Hellen van Meene is honoured to have been invited to become a member of the World Photographic Academy, whose members include Elliott Erwitt, Mary-Ellen Mark, Susan Meiselas, Boris Mikhailov, Martin Parr, Rankin, Tom Stoddart and many more of the "world's leading photographers, gallery owners, major picture editors, photographic foundation directors and other industry experts". These members will form the judging panel for the World Photography Awards in Cannes, April 2008.
Exhibition: Solo in Seoul
- Hellen van Meene will have a solo exhibition at I M ART gallery in Seoul, South Korea from March 6 - April 26 of 2008.
Group exhibition: Inside-Out - Photos from Amsterdam Collections and Archives
Foam - Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam
Keizersgracht 609, Amsterdam, Netherlands
September 28 - December 5
The city of Amsterdam contains within its perimeters a treasure of high quality photography. Much of this photographic wealth can be found in various leading collections and archives, such as the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Stadsarchief Amsterdam and Maria Austria Instituut. Foam Photography Museum Amsterdam has compiled an exhibition showing work from the holdings of all four of these institutions.
Although there are major differences in the origins, composition and aims of these collections and archives, there is also an obvious similarity. In much of the work the subject is people: people of all shapes and sizes. Dress, expression and pose are key elements that form the basis for our judgment and assessment of people. The often complex relationship between external characteristics and a person’s (desired) identity was the theme for the compilation of Inside Out. The show includes work by Johan van der Keuken, Ed van der Elsken, Cor Jaring, Koos Breukel, Bertien van Maanen, Rineke Dijkstra, Hellen van Meene and Celine van Balen. (source)
More in the press release.
Video: Amadelia Interview
Hellen van Meene interviewed (in English) by Christian E. Klinger for
videoblog Amadelia.
The 13:09 minute video starts with a silent 1:06 minute slideshow. The interview as Flash video and a short essay by Klinger are here. There's also a Quicktime version.
There is no theory with which they could be described, but poetry. Hellen van Meene's photographs are a poem.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene
Fotografins Hus
Slupskjulsvägen 26A, Stockholm, Sweden
September 7 - October 28 2007
The exhibition previously shown in Essen and Berlin travels to Stockholm.
For the past seven years, Hellen van Meene has been producing intimate portraits of adolescents. Though the introspective gaze of her models suggest that these are spontaneous, private moments in the lives of her subjects, the carefully considered natural light, lush textures, and striking compositions betray van Meene’s hand in choreographing each image down to the finest detail. The picturesque qualities are undercut by a disquieting tension; the models’ clothes are ill-fitting or inside-out; one girl is asked to lie in a cold bath, fully clothed; another models a fresh bruise. This intimate collaboration between the photographer and her models simultaneously exposes the uncertain nature of adolescent identities and the complicated act of capturing them on film.
Hellen was interviewed by Swedish national television. It was broadcast on 2007-09-07. The interview is in English with Swedish subtitles.
Flickfotograf med hjärna - vi har träffat holländska fotografen Hellen van Meene
Weblogs: The Homan family
Last May and June Hellen van Meene travelled through the South of the US to make new work.
Kalypso Homan from New Orleans has blogged about her experience
of being photographed
and her father Michael uploaded photos of the two sessions to Flickr (first starts here and the second
here).
Group exhibition: Local, El fin de la globalización
(Local, The End of Globalisation)
PHotoEspaña 2007
Consejería de Cultura y Deportes. Sala Canal de Isabel II, Madrid, Spain
June 5 - September 2 2007
This exhibition curated by Paul Wombell features the work of Hans Aarsman, Shelby Lee Adams, Boris Mikhailov, Hashem el Madani, Tom Hunter, Jem Southam, Xavier Ribas, LI Tianbing, Hellen van Meene, Massimo Vitali and Karl Heinz Weinberger.
Hellen van Meene shows works from the Barbara Series. The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue in Spanish and English, with a text by Paul Wombell (ISBN 978-84-451-3000-1).
Review: C|O Berlin
An interview-based article (German, PDF, 159 KB) from the Berliner Morgenpost (May 13 2007).
Da wird van Meene zum Sammler. Fängt intuitiv mit der Kamera ein, was sie nicht wieder hergeben will: ein Stück Verletzlichkeit, fragile Coolness oder einen üppigen Rest Kindlichkeit. Von ihren besten Fotografien schließlich geht dasselbe Strahlen aus, wie es die alten, gemalten Porträts besitzen.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene - Portraits
C|O Berlin
Postfuhramt, Oranienburger Str. / Tucholskystr., 10117 Berlin, Germany
May 10 - July 8 2007
The exhibition previously shown at Museum Folkwang travels to Berlin.
Puberty is a limbo - a state of physical and emotional transition, an uncertain place between melancholy and hope, fear of loss and excitement about the new, surrendering one's identity and defining oneself anew. Hellen van Meene's portraits of adolescents are multi-layered visual metaphors for that in-between period during which childhood is being left behind. With carefully-staged poses taken in soft light with gentle colouring, van Meene explores the boundary between the world of childish fantasy and adult life. The careful observation and intuitive understanding that these photographs display make them unique psychograms, and, with their technically-perfect realisation, photographic masterpieces.
The opening is on May 9.
Group exhibition: Family Pictures
Guggenheim Museum
New York, USA
February 9 - April 16 2007
Featuring works drawn from the Guggenheim museum's permanent collection, Family Pictures explores the representation of families and children in contemporary photography and video.
Family Pictures includes both documentary-style and more clearly staged or manipulated work by 16 artists: Janine Antoni, Patty Chang, Gregory Crewdson, Rineke Dijkstra, Nathalie Djurberg, Anna Gaskell, Nan Goldin, Loretta Lux, Sally Mann, Robert Mapplethorpe, Tracey Moffatt, Catherine Opie, Collier Schorr, Thomas Struth, Hellen van Meene, and Gillian Wearing. A version of this exhibition, accompanied by a catalogue, was presented at the Galleria Gottardo in Lugano, Switzerland in 2005; in New York, Family Pictures includes additional artists and recent acquisitions.
News round-up: Reviews of Hellen's exhibition in New York
- Martha Schwendener for
The New York Times
(pdf mirror):
As always, Ms. van Meene exaggerates what nature has already bestowed, dressing butch girls and femme boys in clothes that further mask their sex or posing teenage mothers with their midriffs bared to reveal distended bellies and stretch marks. Other photographs depict dreamy and dazed adolescents staring into points beyond the picture frame.
There are obvious touchstones for this work: Diane Arbus and Rineke Dijkstra. Like Ms. Dijkstra, Ms. van Meene focuses on teenagers, often at the margins of Europe. Human vulnerability and the plucky dignity summoned by people of all ages to compensate for their limitations are mainstays in Arbus. Formally, Ms. van Meene splits the difference, printing her work in color but at what is, by contemporary standards, rather small scale.
- Sarah Valdez for Time Out New York:
If the show has a theme, it might be diversity; at times the photos seem to be playing a game of compare and contrast. [..] Van Meene adopts a pimples-and-all approach that nonetheless presents each of these young people as gorgeous in his or her own right. There is no apparent political motivation underlying this globe-trotting project, but by casting her eclectic subjects - even those who are wall-eyed, weak-chinned or have outie belly buttons - as sensations unto themselves, the artist discards conventional ideals of beauty while making pointedly beautiful work.
Interview
-
David Toyne interviews Hellen Van Meene for ePHOTOzine.
I think to have a limitation like only twelve shots and no preview is good. It's like having too many choices. You have eight pastries in front of you so you don´t know what to choose anymore, but with three pastries it´s easier. You would think with digital it´s better, but I feel it's the opposite. Less is better. Of course I'll not say digital cannot be good in some ways, but I think for starting out, new photographers should have the feeling of not being sure."
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene - Polaroids
Van Zoetendaal Gallery
Keizersgracht 488, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
February 24 - March 31 2007
Hellen van Meene shows a selection of 40 polaroids at Van Zoetendaal Gallery which she produced since 1996 when she started her career as an artist. Before Van Meene starts photographing her models with the Rolleiflex she uses a Polaroid camera to research light, composition and characteristic qualities of her models. Precious unpretentious images. Beloved by the artist and not for sale.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene
Yancey Richardson Gallery
535 West 22nd Street, NYC 10011, NY, USA
February 2 - March 17 2007
Reception for the artist: Thursday, February 1st 6-8 p.m.
The Yancey Richardson Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of new photographs by Dutch photographer Hellen van Meene. Known for her intimate, intense portraits of adolescent girls and androgynous boys, this is van Meene's first exhibition in the United States since 2001. These recent portraits are primarily the result of travels to Latvia, Russia, London, Japan and Morocco between 2004 and 2006.
Current and upcoming solo exhibitions
- "Hellen van Meene: Portraits 1995-2006"
Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany
2 December 2006 - 25 February 2007 - "Hellen van Meene: New work"
Focal Point Gallery, Southend-on-Sea, UK
16 December 2006 - 3 February 2007 - Schirmer/Mosel Showroom,
Munich/München, Germany
January 25 - March 13 2007 - Yours Gallery,
Warsaw, Poland
20 February - 20 April 2007 - Yancey Richardson Gallery,
New York, USA
Opens 1 February 2007 - C/O Berlin The Cultural Forum for Photography,
Berlin, Germany
11 May - beginning of July 2007 (tbc)
News round-up: Fairs
- Gallery Van Zoetendaal presents new work by Hellen van Meene at Paris Photo 2006 (16-19 november 2006).
- Yancey Richardson Gallery, who's also present at Paris Photo, will show Hellen's work at the fifth editon of Miami's first alternative art fair Scope Miami (6-10 December 2006).
- While you're in Miami you can also go see Sadie Coles HQ at Art Basel Miami Beach (7-10 December 2006).
Auction
- Hellen van Meene has donated a photo to the annual Young in Prison charity photography auction. YiP initiates and organises project for imprisoned children in developing countries. The auction is on Saturday 9 December 2006 in Amsterdam.
Book: The Photobook: A History. Volume II.
"Untitled" (2000) by Hellen van Meene is featured in
Martin Parr and Gerry Badger's
The Photobook: A History. Volume II. (Phaidon, London, 2006).
A quote from the book:
"In recent years, Holland has produced two of the most remarkable portraitists of young people in Dijkstra and Van Meene.
The former, with her air of the objective scientist, represents an approach that is perhaps more fashionable at present,
but Van Meene's 'big sister' approach brings its own, considerable rewards."
About the book:
"Following on from the success of
the first volume, The Photobook: A
History volume II brings the story of the Photobook fully up to date.
It features publications by many well-known photographers ranging from
Man Ray, Ed Ruscha and Andy Warhol to Christian Boltanski, Stephen
Shore and Sophie Calle by way of Bernd and Hilla Becher, Andreas
Gursky and Lewis Baltz. Several innovative books by unknown
photographers are also included, offering an opportunity to discover
these overlooked works."
Gallery: Yancey Richardson Gallery
Hellen van Meene is pleased to announce the representation by
Yancey Richardson Gallery in New York.
The Yancey Richardson Gallery presents exhibitions of work by both established and emerging contemporary photographers as well as exhibitions of vintage prints by photographers who worked earlier in the 20th century.
Represented artists include David Hilliard, Bertien van Manen, Esko Mannikko, Mary Ellen Mark and Sebastiao Salgado.
Recent exhibitions at the gallery have been reviewed in The New York Times, The New Yorker, New York Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Artforum, Artnews and Art in America. Gallery artists are included in museum collections throughout the United States and in Europe and Japan.
Hellen will have a solo exhibition in the beginning of 2007.
Radio: VPRO radio / De Avonden
On Wednesday September 27th
VPRO's De Avonden will feature a conversation between
L.J.A.D. Creyghton and Hellen van Meene, recorded in Huis Marseille.
The station is Concertzender, and Hellen's segment starts around 21:15 hours.
After the broadcast you can listen to it online.
News round-up: TV, Frieze
- Pols Hoogte, TV Noord-Holland's weekly cultural magazine, featured an interview by Andrea van Pol with Hellen van Meene in the episode aired Thursday 21 September 2006.
- Sadie Coles HQ will show works by Hellen van Meene at Frieze Art Fair in London (12 - 15 October 2006). Gallery Koyanagi will be there too.
- Leanne Clarke has written a review of the exhibition at Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool.
News round-up: Huis Marseille exhibition
- Photographer Jan Blankestein has posted photos of the opening on his website.
- The Your Gallery Magazine of The Saatchi Gallery has featured the exhibition.
- There's a review by Han Schoonhoven over at Photoq.
Site update: 15 photos added
The photos section (including the flash version) has been
updated with the new work made in Riga (Latvia), St. Petersburg (Russia), Tokyo (Japan)
and London (UK).
Radio: Interview at BNN United (in Dutch)
BNN United
September 4 2006, 21-22 hrs
A short interview over the phone about Hellen's exhibition at Huis Marseille and the way she works on the street. And why her models don't smile.
Listen to a realaudio stream or download an mp3 (or for those below 30: a podcast) of the show. The interview starts at 41 minutes.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene - Nieuw Werk / New Work
Huis Marseille
Keizersgracht 401, Amsterdam, NL
September 2 - November 26 2006
The opening is on Friday 1 September 2006, 5pm-7pm.
This Autumn Huis Marseille will present an extensive overview of new work by Dutch photographer Hellen van Meene.
Masterclass: Museum Night at Huis Marseille
During the Museum Night on Saturday 4 November 2006 Hellen van Meene will give a public masterclass for young photographers
in Huis Marseille
in Amsterdam. She will review portfolio's and discuss the do's and dont's of portrait photography.
Masterclasses start at 8 and 10 pm.
If you would like to participate in this masterclass and submit a CD of your work
here's more info.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene / New Works
Open Eye Gallery
Liverpool (UK)
July 21 - September 2 2006
After Edinburgh in Scotland the exhibition first shown at Pump House Gallery in London has now travelled to Liverpool.
Dutch photographer Hellen van Meene has received international critical acclaim for her intimate 'fictional portraits' of adolescent girls and androgynous boys that explore the amorphous space between childhood and adulthood. Produced in collaboration with Pump House Gallery, London, this exhibition - her first major solo show in the UK since 2002 - brings together newly commissioned work made in the UK over the last 12 months, alongside recent work made in Japan, Germany, Russia and Latvia.
On Friday 21 July 2006 at 7pm Hellen van Meene will be talking about her work, career and inspiration, against the backdrop of her exhibition in Open Eye. Info and tickets here.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene / New Work
Stills
Edinburgh (UK)
June 3 - July 15 2006
The exhibition first shown at Pump House Gallery in London has travelled to Edinburgh in Scotland.
Visit Stills and experience Hellen van Meene's extraordinary, intimate fictional portraits of adolescent girls and androgynous boys which blur the line between fact and fiction.
Her enduring fascination with the grace and awkwardness that are the physical and psychological hallmarks of this age is developed in her newly commissioned work made with young people and teenage parents in South West London. These are presented alongside recent pieces made in Japan, Russia, Germany, Latvia and Holland.
Creating powerful yet beguiling images, van Meene is drawn to 'eccentric but captivating detail'; light falling on the hairs on an arm, a bruise or hair tangled in branches. She delicately combines documentary language with elements of fantasy and performance to explore and disrupt the relationship between photographer and subject in a deliberate and productive way.
There will be an event on Thursday 22 june 6pm - 9pm where Hellen van Meene will lead an informal seminar in the Stills Resource focusing on the work of six emerging artists. Open to artists working in all disciplines from sculpture to photography, this evening promises to be an incredible opportunity to discuss your practice with an acclaimed international artist.
The next day at 6.30 pm there will be an 'Meet the Artist' event: Hellen van Meene discusses the issues and processes involved in her work with David Williams, Head of Photography at Edinburgh College of Art.
More info on (booking for) these events and the exhibition here.
Magazine articles: Round-up
All the recent solo exhibitions have generated a lot of press coverage. Here's a round-up:
Flash Art - The World's Leading Art Magazine
Vol. XXXIX, No. 248, May-June 2006, p.136
flashartonline.com
"Fresh Start: Hellen van Meene - Between Fact and Fiction", an interview (via MSN) by Gea Politi accompanied by three photos.
"Fresh Start" is a column on the last page of the magazine "that serves as a compass to navigate new territories in art".
"When I see a good face, it feels like reading them. Like a sixth sense feeling and from that point I will choose something that I want to get out of them and try to show it."
Read the interview.
Time Out London
Sally O'Reilly, Thu Apr 27
timeout.com
A 3 out of 6 review of the Pump House Gallery exhibition.
"Seen in faintly ludicrous situations - a tracksuit top zipped up around torso and tree trunk, or hair hooked up hysterically in twigs - her subjects are like characters from a kooky arthouse film."
But O'Reilly observes the opposite of Van Meene's intentions: she sees "a familiar parade of the defiant or underprivileged". She even states that "despite the multicultural mix, interestingly, the familiar London physiognomies emphasise the comparative exoticism of the women from Riga, Heiloo and Saint Petersburg." Whatever.
Read the review.
The British Journal Of Photography
April 5 2006, Vol. 153, Nr. 7577, p.3 + p.16-18.
bjp-online.com
"The Wonder Years", an interview-based article by Diane Smyth accompanied by four photos.
"[..] van Meene hasn't lost her ability to capture the awkward beauty of her young subjects".
Label - The Italian Style Magazine -
international edition
Spring 2006, #21, p.4 + 16 + p.124-131.
labelmag.com
"Peekaboo #2: Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others", a portfolio of eight photos accompanied by text from the Pump House Gallery press release.
HotShoe International - Fresh Perspectives on Contemporary Photography
February/March 2006, Issue 141, p.68-69
hotshoeinternational.com
"Hot Shows: Hellen van Meene / New Works", a highly recommended interview-based article by Basia Sokołowska, accompanied by four photos.
"In van Meene's photographs teenage mothers often appear strong and proud, empowered rather than oppressed by their condition. Approaching her models with a great degree of empathy van Meene succeeds in revealing both their unique strength and vulnerability."
Photoworks
Spring/Summer - May/October 2006, Issue 6, p.12-19
photoworksuk.org
"Hellen van Meene - New Work", a portfolio of seven photos with an great essay by Vince Aletti.
"Featuring folios by Henna Nadeem, Hellen van Meene, Robin Rhode, Tracey Moffatt and Peter Mitchell, the sixth issue of Photoworks looks to the relationship between photography and other media, opening up the magazine to a broader sense of visual culture."
With only a bare wall, a tree trunk, a doorway, or an empty park behind them, van Meene's girls and boys seem more self-possessed and more present than before. Which doesn't make them any easier to read. Are they serene or deeply troubled? Dreamy or quite mad? As the work edges closer to traditional portraiture, it's lost none of its ability to unsettle us, often by undermining our notions of what portraiture can do. Van Meene is still making it up as she goes. Working away from home means leaving much more of the process up to chance and 'working with what you have got on that moment'. 'That can be surprisingly fascinating,' she says, offering the photographs in this portfolio as evidence that she can locate the fine line between naturalism and stylization, truth and fiction, no matter where in the world she is.From the essay by Vince Aletti on page 13. Vince Aletti is a writer living in New York. He is a regular columnist for Modern Painters, The Village Voice, Aperture, Art Review and Artforum. He received the ICP Infinity Award for writing in 2005.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene / New Works
Pump House Gallery
Battersea Park, London SW11 (UK)
March 22 - May 14 2006
This is the first major solo presentation of work in the UK by Dutch photographer Hellen van Meene since 2002. Known for her intimate portraiture of adolescent girls and androgynous boys that blur the line between fact and fiction, Pump House Gallery has commissioned van Meene to make new works in London. These focus on teenagers and teenage parents in the gallery's local community and will be shown alongside new works made in Japan, Russia, Germany, Latvia and Holland. Van Meene's work enters the realm of fantasy, performance and psychological space, creating a powerful and beguiling concoction.
Solo exhibition: Hellen van Meene "A Sense of You, Created by Me"
Gallery Koyanagi
Tokyo (Japan)
March 16 - April 20 2006
The second solo show by Hellen van Meene at Gallery Koyanagi features new works made in Germany, The Netherlands, Japan, Latvia, Russia and the UK.
Solo exhibition: Tokyo Girls
Tokyo Wonder Site Shibuya
(トーキョーワンダーサイト渋谷)
Tokyo (Japan)
March 16 - April 12 2006
This exhibition opens on the same day as the exhibition at Gallery Koyanagi, also in Tokyo. It will feature almost 25 photos, most of them made in Tokyo during an assignment for a portfolio in The New York Times Magazine.
Event: Kunst op Kamers / Museum In 't Houten Huis
Museum In 't Houten Huis
De Rijp (NL)
May 28-29 2006
For this bi-annual event 22 artists exhibit or perform their work in homes, sheds and gardens of people in this picturesque village in North-Holland.
Hellen van Meene shows work commissioned by Ferragamo and Pop Magazine. Also part of the project was a photography workshop done in two classes at a primary school. The photos made by the kids with disposable cameras are shown in the museum as well.
The Kunst op Kamers event is one weekend, but Hellen's exhibition will be shown until July 23.
Update: one of the highlights of the weekend was Strandbeest by Theo Jansen. Watch this amazing creature made from PVC pipe and propelled by compressed air in this video from ArtFutura 2005:
Story: A Shinagawa Monkey - The New Yorker
The New Yorker, The Anniversary Issue, February 13 & 20, 2006
A fiction story by Haruki Murakami is illustrated with a photo by
Tim Flach and one by Hellen van Meene. Because the magazine hardly contains photography - it is famous for its cartoons -
the two photos feature quite prominently.
Group exhibition: L'esprit du Nord: Netherlands Now - L'�cole du Nord
MEP - Maison Europ�ene de la Photographie
Paris (FR)
March 15 - June 11 2006
This group exhibition presents works dating from 2000 to 2005 by 26 Dutch photographers: Woud Berger, Anuschka Blommers/Niels Schumm, Koos Breukel, Elspeth Diederix, Rineke Dijkstra, Leo Divendal, Desiree Dolron, Charlotte Dumas, Marnix Goossens, Risk Hazekamp, Juul Hondius, Paul Kooiker, Annaleen Louwes, Arno Nollen, Erwin Olaf, Johannes Schwartz, Harold Strak, C�line van Balen, Gerald van der Kaap, Carla van de Puttelaar, Frank van der Salm, Lidwien van der Ven, Bertien van Manen, Hellen van Meene, Inez van Lamsweerde/Vinoodh Matadin, Edwin Zwakman. Maison Europ�ene de la Photographie is a major centre for contemporary photographic art situated in the historic heart of Paris.
The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue.
Group exhibition: Portaal naar de hemel - Hedendaagse portretfoto's in oude lijsten
Frans Hals Museum
Haarlem (NL)
January 20 - April 2 2006
Masterpieces of Dutch portrait photography shown in old frames from the Frits Lugt Collection. Curator Willem van Zoetendaal has combined a selection from the thousand or so old frames with photos from contemporary Dutch portrait photographers such as Céline van Balen, Koos Breukel, Rineke Dijkstra, Bertien van Manen and Hellen van Meene. A catalogue accompanies the exhibition.
This group exhibition was first shown at the Institut Néerlandais in Paris.
Book: Art Photography Now - Susan Bright
Hardcover with jacket
250 four-color illustrations
224 Pages
9" X 10.75"
ISBN: 1-931788-91-X
(Aperture) and
0500543054 (Thames and Hudson)
"This stunning survey presents the work of seventy-six of the most important and best-loved artist-photographers in the world today. Art Photography Now is a truly comprehensive guide to the essential aspects of contemporary photography."
The book features three Dutch photographers: Rineke Dijkstra, Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin and Hellen van Meene.
More information on the sites of Thames & Hudson and Aperture. Amazon has a review from Publishers Weekly.
Group exhibition: Recent acquisitions / Nieuwe aanwinsten - Museum of Photography The Hague
Museum of Photography The Hague
The Hague (NL)
December 3 2005 - Jan (?) 2006
This is the 13th (or 15th if you count Basel & Paris Photo) group exhibition this year. It presents Hellen van Meene alongside Hans op de Beeck, Rineke Dijkstra, Boris Mikhailov, Holger Niehaus, Hellen van Meene, Arnulf Rainer, Leora Laor, Mark Morrisroe and Hiroshi Sugimoto.
Group exhibition: Family Pictures: Contemporary Photography and Video from the Collection of the Guggenheim Museum
Galleria Gottardo
Lugano (Switzerland)
September 28 2005 - December 23 2005
An exhibition of works from the photography and video collection of the Guggenheim Museum featuring these "important contemporary artists": Janine Antoni, Patty Chang, Gregory Crewdson, Rineke Dijkstra, Anna Gaskell, Loretta Lux, Sally Mann, Robert Mapplethorpe, Tracey Moffat, Catherine Opie, Thomas Struth, Hellen van Meene and Gillian Wearing. The exhibition includes a selection of images, at times provocative and ironic, that show the paradoxes of family life and what lies beneath the surface of its traditional representations.
More about the exhibition and the catalogue (ISBN 8887469407).
Group exhibition: The Wonderful Fund on Tour
Le Musée de Marrakech
Marrakech (Morocco)
October 1 2005 - January 15 2006
Nearly 100 works of contemporary art - purchased by Vanessa Branson and Prue O'Day as curators for the London-based collectors group The Wonderful Fund - will be exhibited at Le Musée de Marrakech to open the first Arts in Marrakech Festival (AiM) Festival. The Wonderful Fund is a collection of international visual art by more than 64 artists including Sarah Lucas, Grayson Perry, Jake & Dinos Chapman, Tracey Emin, Gavin Turk and Hellen van Meene.
Lecture in Dutch: Club_Foam avond - Het fotografische portret - tussen individu en type
De Club_Foam avond van woensdag 30 november 2005 om 20.00 uur is gewijd aan verschillende vormen van portretfotografie, de intenties van de maker en de wijze waarop deze zich vertalen in een specifieke werkwijze en in presentatievormen. Johan de Vos, fotografiecriticus van De Standaard, zal de avond inleiden en ingaan op de diversiteit binnen de portretfotografie. Hellen van Meene, Koos Breukel en Jan Rothuizen tonen voorbeelden van hun werk en lichten deze nader toe.
Event: Paris Photo 2005
Carrousel du Louvre
Paris (France)
November 17 - 20 2005
Gallery Willem van Zoetendaal will present new work by Hellen van Meene at the 9th edition of the leading international photography fair. He will be among 106 galleries and publishers from 14 countries in the historical premises of the Carrousel du Louvre.
Group exhibition: Frames Revisited / Cadres revisités
Institut Néerlandais
Cultural Centre of The Netherlands
Paris (France)
November 3 - December 18 2005
Masterpieces of Dutch portrait photography shown in old frames from the Frits Lugt Collection. Curator Willem van Zoetendaal has combined a selection from the thousand or so old frames with photos from contemporary Dutch portrait photographers such as Céline van Balen, Koos Breukel, Rineke Dijkstra, Bertien van Manen and Hellen van Meene. A catalogue accompanies the exhibition.
The exhibition will move to the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem after Paris.
Group exhibition: Bidibidobidiboo - Works from the Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Collection
Guarene d'Alba
Turin (Italy)
May 31 - October 2 2005
The exhibition is curated by Francesco Bonami and features major works from the Sandretto Re Rebaudengo contemporary art collection and reflects the art scene of the last two decades.
The exhibitions ranges in media from installation, photography, painting, video, and sculpture, featuring 150 artists in all, including Hellen van Meene. Some of the other artists working with photography include Darren Almond, Vanessa Beecroft, Thomas Demand, Sarah Lucas, Thomas Ruff, Cindy Sherman, Sam Taylor-Wood, Wolfgang Tillmans, Gillian Wearing and Andreas Gursky.
Editorial fashion shoot: Linda Evangelista for Pop Magazine
From the contents page of Pop Magazine issue 11 (autumn/winter 2005):
"Linda Evangelista is photographed for POP at
her barest by wonderful art photographer Hellen van Meene".
Group exhibition: Feiten & Foto's
Feiten & Foto's (Facts & photos) is a travelling outdoor photo exhibition sponsored by Dove.
20 Dutch photographers were asked to submit work based on the perception of beauty by Dutch women.
Hellen's contribution is an alternate view of a portrait featured in the
portfolio in NYT Magazine this spring
in Tokyo. The exhibition opened 2005-09-03 on the Museumplein in Amsterdam and will travel to five other
cities
in the Netherlands this year.
"Dove hopes that through this exhibition women will broaden their view on beauty." And a cynic would add that they hope to sell some more of their beauty products. More info on dates and all contributions are here (in Dutch).
Magazine article: Geo Magazin - Pubertät
An article on puberty in this German natural science magazine is illustrated by many photos,
including five by Hellen van Meene.
Fellow Dutch artists Ari Versluis & Ellie Uyttenbroek are
featured prominently as well with examples of their ongoing Exactitudes ® series.
The magazine has a circulation of about 450,000 copies.
Group exhibition:
A view of women: Portraits from the photo collection
Blik op vrouwen: Portretten uit de fotocollectie
An exhibition at De Hallen in Haarlem (NL) of forty photographic portraits of women from the museums acquisitions in the last four years.
Hellen van Meene is featured among works by Koos Breukel, Céline van Balen, Dana Lixenberg, Martine Stig, Sarah Lucas, Tracey Moffat,
and Juergen Teller and others.
Magazine article: Madame Figaro Japon
A small article in the May issue of this Japanese women's fashion magazine as part of
a feature on young(ish) female photographers.
Event: Book signing at Photo-London 05
Hellen van Meene will do a book signing at the Aperture stand at the Photo-London 05 international photography fair in the
Royal Academy of Arts' Burlington Gardens, London, UK on Friday 20 May 2005 at around 2.30 pm.
It's a last-minute addition so it's not in the programme.
Group exhibition: In Sight: Contemporary Dutch Photography from the Collection of the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam
In the mail today: the catalogue published at the occasion of the
exhibition
In Sight: Contemporary Dutch Photography from the Collection of the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam,
held at the Art Institute of Chicago .
It's a nice book, despite the fact that the work is not really "contemporary": most of the photos were made in the 1990's. The three works by Hellen van Meene are from 1996.
Read more about this catalogue.
Magazine article: Portfolio in The New York Times Magazine
The Sunday April 3 2005 edition of The New York Times Magazine features a seven page portfolio of photos Hellen van Meene made on assignment for the magazine in Japan in February/March of this year.
''This is not just you, now,'' she explains. ''This is a sense of you, created by me.''More about this portfolio, including links and quotes.
2005-03-31
Group exhibitions: Six group exhibitions opening in February and March
In Sight at The Art Institute of Chicago (USA) shows contemporary Dutch photography from the collection of the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam (from 26/3).
Reason Compassion Justice: A Benefit for the Drug Policy Alliance at Cheim & Read Gallery in New York (USA) is a sale of contemporary artworks to benefit the Drug Policy Alliance (at 29/3).
Der fotografierte Mensch at Neues Museum in Nürnberg (DE). The title of this exhibition translates as "Man photographed: From the beginnings to today - pictures from the photography collection of Museum Folkwang in Essen" (from 23/3).
Constructed Moment at Stichting KW14 in 's-Hertogenbosch (NL) investigates the prominent role of photography in today's visual arts (from 26/2).
H x B x D at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag (NL) forces a lot of bank employees to be parted from their art: Dutch modern art from the Rabobank collection (from 26/2).
Bronnen at Museum Kranenburgh in Bergen (NL) brings together the work of artists who attended the same high school in Bergen (from 20/2).
2005-02-01 + 2005-02-20 + 2005-04-01
Press: 'Portraits' is one of the Top 25 Photo Books of 2004
Hellen van Meene's latest book is number 24 in
critic Vince Aletti's picks for the
top 25 photo books of last year in
The Village Voice ("New York's most influential must-read alternative newspaper").
This is the top 5 as published on January 24 2005:
- Lee Friedlander - Sticks & Stones: Architectural America
- Stephen Shore - Uncommon Places: The Complete Works (highly recommended!)
- Robert Frank - Storylines
- Joel Sternfeld - American Prospects
- Martin Parr and Gerry Badger - The Photobook: A History, Volume I
And there's buzz going round that the book is going to get a second printing this year so maybe now's the time to get your first edition!
2005-02-03
Dutch media: Regionale voorpagina en TV optreden
Naar aanleiding van de lezing van dinsdag 8 februari stond gisteren een foto door Hellen van Meene prominent op de voorpagina van de Alkmaarsche Courant / Noordhollands Dagblad. Bij het interview op de voorkant van het Cultuur katern stond een tweede foto.
Vanavond zal vanaf 18:00 elk uur een item op basis van een interview worden uitgezonden op RTV Noord-Holland. Via de site is de uitzending ook te zien.
2005-02-04
Lecture in Dutch: Fotografe Hellen van Meene te gast bij Zwaan & Ter Burg
Op dinsdag 8 februari 2005 is de Alkmaarse Hellen van Meene te gast bij boekhandel Zwaan & Ter Burg in Alkmaar. Aan de hand van een serie dia's vertelt Van Meene deze avond op geheel eigen wijze over de totstandkoming van haar werk.
2005-01-09
Frontpage
For the last issue of the year the Dutch newspaper Volkskrant traditionally devotes a supplement to photography. This year's "Observatorium" features two photos by Hellen van Meene. Merel Bem interviewed her for a short article. On the frontpage a detail of one of these photos is used to advertise the supplement.
2004-12-31
Human Conditions, Intimate Portraits
This group exhibition opened December 17th at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Dunaújváros, Hungary. It's a travelling exhibition that has been shown before in Rotterdam, Montreal, Rubiëra (Italy) and Madrid. It's curated by Frits Giertsberg and features Céline van Balen, Wout Berger / Noor Damen, Koos Breukel, Rineke Dijkstra, Romy Finke, Rince de Jong, Bertien van Manen, Hellen van Meene, Corinne Noordenbos and Albert Westing.
2004-12-19
The Dutch show. Contemporary Dutch artists in Greek collections.
This group exhibition opens tonight at The Netherlands Institute in Athens, Greece. It will run thru January 23rd of 2005 and contains two works by Van Meene from the collection of Mr. Papadimitriou among works by Bas Jan Ader, René Daniëls, Marlene Dumas, Henk Visch, Niek Kemps, Philip Akkerman, Rob Scholte, Michael Raedecker, Pat Andrea, Aernout Mik, Robert Suermond, Rineke Dijkstra, Marc Bijl, Iris van Dongen, Ed van der Elsken, Madeleine Berkhemer, Roger Cremers, Liza May Post, Lilly van der Stocker / Angela Bulloch and Inez van Lamsweerde.
2004-12-9
Noa
On Friday 2004-11-26 at 1.19 AM Hellen has given birth to her second daughter:
Noa Francesca Zeta van Eykelen. She weighed 4.5 kilograms (that's 9.9 pounds). Mother and daughter are
doing very well, and her father (who's writing this as he's also the
webmaster) is the proudest man
in the world today!
2004-11-29
Calendar: Kunstcollectie Rabobank 2005
In the mail today: a copy of a 2005 week calendar,
published by a large Dutch bank, that features a photo by Hellen van Meene.
It's a very nice collection that includes work by other photographers like
Céline van Balen, Koos Breukel, Elspeth Diederix, Rineke Dijkstra, Désirée Dolron, Teun Hocks, Micha Klein, Inez van Lamsweerde,
and many more (52 + 12 + 1, actually).
More info and scans here.
The calendar is distributed among clients.
The calendar is based on the Rabobank art collection. This same collection of contemporary Dutch art - including Hellen's work - will be shown in an exhibition called "Hoogte x Breedte x Diepte (HxBxD)" at the Gemeentemuseum, Fotomuseum and GEM in Den Haag (The Hague, NL) from 2005-2-26 - 2005-5-8.
2004-10-2
Guy Bourdin vs. Hellen van Meene ...
"Van Meene's work isn't totally unlike that of the late fashion photographer Guy Bourdin. But it is markedly less demeaning than his often sadistic images of young girls in too much makeup striking compromising poses. Van Meene's empathy for her subjects shines through".
From: Sarah Valdez' article about the show at Matthew Marks in 2001.
If you're in Amsterdam between 2004-9-24 and 2005-1-5 you can judge for yourself at the Guy Bourdin exhibition at Foam, the museum for photography in Amsterdam that showed Hellen's work in their opening exhibition Dutchdelight in 2001. More Guy Bourdin photos here.
2004-9-23
Competing for a Sustainable Future
Photos - including some new ones - used in all publication material for the
The European Conference on Corporate Social Responsibility.
(Please wait for the photo to reveal that it's actually a Flash slideshow.)
Court case
- [Nederlands] Dossier Paul Andriesse vs. Hellen van Meene.
- [English] Read about the Paul Andriesse vs. Hellen van Meene court case.