NO MANNERS
Andrea van der Straeten chooses and implements a respective style for her works from a broad sectrum of cematic, photgraphic, installation-based, graphic, auditive and performative techniques. In doing so she analyses the respective media as well as processes and functional contexts within the art itself.
In many of her works she combines her interest in language and literature with a visual surprising vocabulary and an experimental technical approach: when she underlines the aggressive power of assaulting language in a series of laser cuts on paper by combining aesthetically striking colors and materials with the cut out of letters that remind of bullet holes, or when she uses semitransparent dry waxed pizza paper for drawings and texts to form poetic samples.
She repeatedly pursues her concept for a work by refering to a story, which becomes manifest at particular points in history. The referential space here is defined as a broad spectrum that includes women’s and gender issues, biographical moments and political events as well as local and literary sources, and extends to the history of art and institutions. This referencing and artistic re-working of reference material takes the form of deconstructing history as a fixed narrative form. The artist proves to employ a particular precision in her choice of subject matter in this field and be sensitive to connections and contexts.