Marilène Oliver
Dervishes
(sculpture)
15.05. – 21.06.2008
Reception with the artist
Thursday, 15.05., 19-22 h

The transparent sculptures by Londoner Marilène Oliver (*1977) show an extraordinary glimpse inside the body. At the interface between technology and sculpture, powerful three-dimensional portraits come into being.
Since her first solo exhibition in London 2003, Marilène Oliver has tirelessly continued to carve a unique place for herself in the art world, somewhere in between the disciplines of sculpture, printmaking, digital media and anatomy. Oliver uses digital copies of the human body (afforded by digital medical imaging technologies such as MRI and CT) in order to create figurative sculptures. Through this form of digital data re-materialisation, Oliver provokes questions about the perception and identity of the human body in an increasingly digitized world.
With her work Family Portrait (Magnetic Resonance Images of her own family) Oliver previously fascinated Berlin audiences in 2004. As a result, these works were shown in numerous German Institutions.
In her new work she utilised an anonymous CT dataset of a full female body called MELANIX, which she downloaded from the Internet. The three dimensional capacity of Computer Tomography broadens Oliver’s means of expression. From 36 individual longitudinal sections of MELANIX, printed onto transparent material, Dervishes originated, the title given to these powerful figures by the artist. Suspended from the ceiling and spinning around their axes like dancing Dervishes, the disembodied dataset turns into a ‘moving encounter’.
It is the holistic approach of the Renaissance that interests Oliver and as in her work Leonardos Great Lady where this inspiration takes shape. As a new challenge for today, Marilène Oliver seeks in the amalgamation of science and art the attainment of new perceptions.

www.marileneoliver.com