Marijn Bax (1981) lives and works in Amsterdam The Netherlands and is educated at the Academy of Art and Graphics – Sint Joost, Breda, NL
In her work she examines the boundaries of interpretation. She's inspired by the stories she finds in the buildings or places within which she works. The spaces themselves, the personal narratives she retrieves from the archives and her interest in human psychology come together in experiences that are often intimate and that always push, question and dissolve boundaries. In her work, past and present collide; private and public merge; and fact and fiction become incredibly hard to tell apart.
By muddying the lines we normally draw between these domains, Bax asks her visitors to reflect upon their own patterns and habits of thought. Now that we supposedly live in a 'post-truth' era, Bax asks her audience: How, exactly, do you interpret a story when you hear, read, or see it? How do your own past, presumptions and preoccupations shape your interpretations? What is 'truth', anyway, and is it possible ever to get at it?
Bax plays around with the familiar and the seemingly recognizable, and in doing so holds up a mirror for us to peer into. With her in-situ installations she moreover emphasizes the role of space and time in shaping our experiences. Now that nearly every image can be called up in high-res in mere seconds over the internet, Bax resists all that is instant and omnipresent, emphasising the local, the slow and the specific instead. What does it mean to be a member of the audience if you have to go out of your way to see a work of art, if physical movement is required, and if your presence directly changes the work itself?