from 29.05.05 to 25.09.05, Antwerpen.

On the museums request, Philippe Pirotte, director of Kunsthalle Bern and Objectif-exhibitions, brought together 9 artists: Boy & Erik Stappaerts (B), Yutaka Sone (Japan), Corey McCorkle (USA), Mark Lewis (CAN), Niels Donckers (B), Lee Bul (Korea), Miroslaw Balka (P), Sven Augustijnen (B) and Knut Asdam (N).

The author Longus (Lesbos, end 2nd-beginning 3rd century) writes the first idyl with the pastoral tale Daphnis & Chloe: a story about a tender love without further intrigues. He is supposed to have written this work as a response to a rock-drawing depicting a love story. He answers that picture.

But the exhibition was not only conceived for Middelheim by virtue of ties with the art-historical past. The park itself embodies the exhibitions theme: a place for the idyllic. In this, the word idyl refers to a temporary adjournment of reality, to a complete whole of ideal circumstances. Quite often it has to do with a figure in terms its relationship with a landscape. A park like Middelheim Museum, once conceived and laid-out as a victory over nature, is now thought of by urbanites as an idyllic spot where tranquility and fresh air offer a welcome respite from the citys pressurized reality. But what does art have to do with it? Why would the artist engage in a confrontation with natures creative power? It is precisely the city, which forms the natural habitat of an artwork. The park, where nature is in fact a kind of human artifact, is the place to seek out this tension. This is the reason why artists were chosen who actively pursue this selfsame investigation in their work.