Ana Navas: A Veil as a Glaze

In her presentation, the veil symbolises the complexity of our perception. Like a veil, simultaneously concealing and revealing, Navas’s work vividly illustrates how our personal history, time, and surroundings invariably shape our worldview. Her glass collages establish new connections between images, experiences, ideas, times, and places, seamlessly integrating into the ambience of the Oude Kerk, where the processes of change from throughout its history are evident.

A common thread in Navas’s work is her fascination for features and motifs in visual culture, which fluidly traverse disciplines such as art and design, as well as genres and eras. In her work, she explores the interplay between high and popular culture and the way art is perceived and transformed outside the context of art itself. 

In the recently restored Mirror Room, Navas became fascinated by the painted wallpaper with bird and flower motifs. The leaves of the vines do not match the flowers. These fantasy plants reminded Navas of paintings by Western European artists such as Picasso and Matisse who painted women in 'Eastern' atmospheres. It also reminded her of the imaginative paintings of Rembrandt van Rijn where he depicted his wife, Saskia van Uylenburgh, as Flora, the Roman goddess of flowers and spring. Rembrandt recorded his marriage to Saskia in the Mirror Room.

Ana Navas (b. 1984) is a Venezuelan - Ecuadorian artist. Combining multiple media, her work deals with processes such as translation, assimilation and appropriation. She often explores an object’s genealogy analyzing what its possible ancestors are or the new contexts in which it might reappear. Between 2004 to 2010 she attended the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Karlsruhe, where she was "Meisterschülerin" with Franz Ackermann. Between 2012 and 2014 she was a resident at De Ateliers Amsterdam. Navas' work is exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions and is included in museum collections in the Netherlands and abroad.

Ana Navas participated in the 3Package Deal 2022/2023. This initiative, led by the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts (AFK) and the City of Amsterdam’s Bureau Broedplaatsen (Bureau for Cultural Spaces), establishes coalitions among art institutions to mentor talented artists for a year. The Reinwardt Academy, H401, Museum Van Loon, and the Oude Kerk comprise the Inter-historicity coalition. 
The exhibition is supported with a generous contribution from the Mondriaan Fund (artist fee scheme).