Ans Mertens

1989, lives and works in Antwerp and Brussels, Belgium

The work of Ans Mertens plays on the tension between objective recordings and subjective image making. The lone gaze of her lens surveys a scene, disembodied. Yet we cannot but identify with it; what is being shown is always that which has already been seen. Mertens plays with proximity and remoteness, the spatial dynamics that attract our attention and draw the eye to understand visibility as a fleeting condition of the things we see. The work of Ans Mertens also shows that time, perhaps more than space, is the ultimate subject of all film: time captured, time chased. Arranged, erased, wasted. Leisurely spent, unspectacularly passed.

Ans Mertens holds a Masters in Free Arts at Sint Lukas Brussels. She is part of the artist collective SOIL Collective.

Ans Mertens is invited to participate in the fourth edition of STRT Kit.