Natascha Niederstrass, The Vanishing Woman / Escamotage d’une femme — Emmanuelle Choquette

[Summer 2023]

Natascha Niederstrass, Série / series Sans titre (disparition) / Untitled (disappearance), 122 × 92 cm, photos : Maxime Brouillet

By Emmanuelle Choquette

Galerie Patrick Mikhail, Montréal
19.11.2022 — 4.02.2023

[Excerpt]

The exhibition The Vanishing Woman, presented at Galerie Patrick Mikhail, follows on from a series produced during a residency at Centre VU. This is a new iteration of the project, which was first shown during Manif d’art 10 – La biennale de Québec, for which the theme was Les illusions sont réelles (Illusions are real). It’s not by chance that this body of work fits neatly within that theme, as the artist, Natascha Niederstrass, probes the complex relationship among narrative, archives, fiction, and truth(s).

Niederstrass adopts an investigative approach that borrows from the forensic aesthetic. Her projects are often inspired by local news items, which she treats as raw material for an exploration of the borders between reality and speculation. Through photography, video, sculpture, and installation, she reconstructs crime scenes and threads of historical or tragic events. Common to all her works is her desire to feature multiple narratives and different perspectives on specific subjects. In legal language, reconstruction is not based on scientific evidence but leaves room for subjectivity:¹ “Its goal being to present the likely conditions of a given situation, it fully fils an illustrative function.”² It is within this interpretive regime that Niederstrass’s works operate, placing viewers in a position of active reflection…

[ Complete issue, in print and digital version, available here: Ciel variable 123 – THE POWER OF INTIMACY ]
[ Complete article, in digital version, available here: Natascha Niederstrass, The Vanishing Woman / Escamotage d’une femme — Emmanuelle Choquette ]