Amanda Koelman Amanda Koelman
Amanda Koelman (b. 1985) is an artist whose work emanates from the belief that all humans strive to make sense of the universe around them. As throughout history and geography, people have created fairy tales, fables, fantastic stories, sagas, myths, and religions in order to conceive some sort of understanding of their surroundings. Koelman combines knowledge, ideas and elements from various times and different places in order to provide carnavalesque connections between stories, substances and the collective attribution of meaning. The used imagery and metaphors stem from different parts of the world and are combined by Koelman in a free and loose aesthatic that is nevertheless dense and layered. The work addresses a space beyond the material and rational world; where it enters the realm of hybrid myths and complex magic. The sensual, spontaneous, and emotional aspects of human nature are connected with the notions of birth and death, and everything in between.
She graduated from CABK Zwolle and the Dutch Art Institute Arnhem. Her works have been presented at Galeria Bielska BWA, Poland (2013), Kaus Australis, Rotterdam (2011), M HKA, Antwerp, Belgium (2010), Olchon, Siberia, Russia (2010), Crete, Greece (2009) and Imago Dei Gallery, Kathmandu, Nepal (2007), Framer Framed, Amsterdam (2015). In 2010 Koelman made the publication ‘Ach Ach en Owee’ in collaboration with Spinvis.
Koelman was a participating artist in the Framer Framed group exhibition Ancestral Blues – Return to the State of L3 on show 16 September to 11 October 2015, curated by Vincent van Velsen, drawing on the work of international art collective The State of L3.
She currently lives and works between Amsterdam and Bergen.
Exhibitions
