Picture by Jade KerremansMarlies Vander Straeten (BE, 1993) is a visual artist who creates playfully. The classroom in which her studio is located serves as her playground.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Her paintings and drawings are painted over several times and read like a layered weave of dreamy stories and recurring self-invented symbols. A symbolism that arises through a play of different media.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Pudding cups are transformed into molds for sculptures, there are old board games on the floor of her studio and wires are attached to the ceiling for homemade flags for (as yet) non-existing countries.
Play, feeling and time is the atmosphere in which Vander Straeten creates. Everything is made by hand so time is almost tactile in the work. It also adds to its sensitivity. Each flag harks back to a snapshot of a feeling. She wants to convey a feeling and not a story.
First solo exhibition at Tatjana Pieters Gallery, 2022