Born in 1982 in Wuppertal, Germany
Lives and works in Wuppertal, Germany
Reflection
Photographer, video-maker and acrobat Isabelle Wenzel uses her own body in all of her photos. These photographs are taken in a repeti- tive motion of setting the timer and posing, merging into hour-long sessions revolving around the ten second countdown. In this way, Wenzel does her own little experimental performance in front of the camera, which captures it for the viewer in “frozen” form as a photograph. As a result, often times the photos are lively and filled with movement. The central focus of the photographs of Isabelle Wenzel is the body as a physical form, rather than people themselves. By making a photograph, she freezes a pose in time as it were, and in doing so draws attention to the sculptural qualities of the body. She dehumanizes and alienates the human figure into an aesthetic form to observe as a physical manifestation in and as part of the space.
Isabelle will present a solo show combining two series: a retrospective of works made over the last ten years, and a series of photographs based on her latest film Automatia, which will also be screened at the salon.
Since her graduation from the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam in 2010, Isabelle’s work has been exhibited in numerous museums and fairs including the Nederlands Fotomuseum (NL), Fotografisk Center (DK), FOAM (NL), Metro Hall (CA) as well as Art Rotterdam, Unseen and Brighton Photo Biennial. In 2020 Isabelle published her book Counting Till Ten and aside from her autonomous work she does a lot of fashion photography, which increasingly becomes a more prominent element in her artistic work.
