Radiating with/from Leonie Gossens
Herinneringen Planten / Planting Memories
08–06-2025, 15:00 - 20:00
︎ guest exhibition
︎ process
︎ knowledges
︎ friendship
‘Radiating’ is a small series of day exhibitions, events, workshops, meet ups in my studio at NS16, Tilburg, which are meant to support a community of experimental photographers, researchers and artists who are based in the Netherlands or are passing by. The irregular program is mainly focused on analogue and alternative photography, process-based art, material research, DIY experiments, and more-than-human storytelling. The incentive is to radiate energy from inside out and from outside in.
‘Radiating’ will show work of fellow artists in person and online in this website blog; it will spread experience, recipes and knowledge of the process; and share resources – material and financial if available.
This event is kindly supported, as part of my practice, by Makersfonds Tilburg.
My second guest is an artist Leonie Gossens who will present selection of prints in the series Herinneringen Planten / Planting Memories. During the afternoon there will be room to experiment with alternative processes such as lumen prints as far as the weather allows us. You are cordially invited to join us for the afternoon, between 3 - 8 pm, Sunday 08.06. at studios NS16.
Herinneringen Planten, Leonie Gossens
Leonie Gossens graduated in 2021 cum laude from Photographic Design at NAVB Rotterdam with Project Planting Memories and Project Representation of Miscarriage in Visual Culture / I Miss.
Since 2022 she is working as a photography teacher (both digital and analogue photography). Together with other photography enthousiasts she started Club Caffenol, a place for learning about more sustainable darkroom and alternative techniques, in @delichtkamer in Den Bosch.
As a photographer and artist, she captures what is no longer there, has not yet been or may not have been. Not the here and now, but the absent she translates into something visible. The starting point for her photographic and visual experiments is a sensitivity to the seemingly unnoted, the unwitnessed or deviant. The search for a visual and tangible translation urges her to create.
Follow the artist @leonie_gossens_fotonomie
Herinneringen Planten, Leonie Gossens
Herinneringen Planten, Leonie Gossens
Asking a few questions to Leonie:
1. Can you introduce your process?
Existing photographic material as well as an image from everyday reality can be the starting point for my visual research. With analog and digital photographic techniques I manipulate the existing image into something new. The research phase is an essential part for the photographic and visual materiality that ultimately arises. An even though I read and study a lot before working on a project, it is by exploring and doing, acting with my hands that my mind will start to construct thoughts and patterns, I get a sense of meaning. It’s a delicate balance between knowing and feeling.
Especially in Planting Memories I wanted to express that not only the image itself but also the the act of creating images is a way to keep memories alive. I examined the memory of my grandmother by studying the photos. Can I find my grandmother in the photos and see more than the object (treasured prints on paper) (“punctum” as Barthes calls it in Camera Lucida)? I try to get closer to my memory by altering the photos, re-owning the photos; examine close to the skin, re-photograph and print the image.
2. The techniques that you use, such as lumen prints, are fading unless they are fixed. How do you approach this fleeting condition? In addition to memories that were captured by a photograph but are now allowed to be altered and re-photographed by your process.
3. I believe your work resist the term ‘plant-blidness’. Do you also see it that way? And what does the storytelling with plants as materials and as subjects teach you/can teach others?
4. Finally, I would like to ask about your engagement with more sustainable processes and your work you do in the darkroom De Lichtkamer. Can you introduce your work as a teacher and how can others connect with you?
1. Can you introduce your process?
Existing photographic material as well as an image from everyday reality can be the starting point for my visual research. With analog and digital photographic techniques I manipulate the existing image into something new. The research phase is an essential part for the photographic and visual materiality that ultimately arises. An even though I read and study a lot before working on a project, it is by exploring and doing, acting with my hands that my mind will start to construct thoughts and patterns, I get a sense of meaning. It’s a delicate balance between knowing and feeling.
Especially in Planting Memories I wanted to express that not only the image itself but also the the act of creating images is a way to keep memories alive. I examined the memory of my grandmother by studying the photos. Can I find my grandmother in the photos and see more than the object (treasured prints on paper) (“punctum” as Barthes calls it in Camera Lucida)? I try to get closer to my memory by altering the photos, re-owning the photos; examine close to the skin, re-photograph and print the image.
2. The techniques that you use, such as lumen prints, are fading unless they are fixed. How do you approach this fleeting condition? In addition to memories that were captured by a photograph but are now allowed to be altered and re-photographed by your process.
3. I believe your work resist the term ‘plant-blidness’. Do you also see it that way? And what does the storytelling with plants as materials and as subjects teach you/can teach others?
4. Finally, I would like to ask about your engagement with more sustainable processes and your work you do in the darkroom De Lichtkamer. Can you introduce your work as a teacher and how can others connect with you?