'Hidden Objects'

The Hidden Objects series shows everyday household objects, such as a blue bin liner and a fruit case. These objects are put into motion by a record player. The turning movements are recorded by a camera with a long shutter speed. The suggestion of volume is created by adding this fourth dimension of time. The best possible use is made of the opportunity to create a false reality with photography. A ‘hidden object’ appears in the metamorphosis of the moving image.

Scheltens & Abbenes, a designing duo, play with photography’s provocative possibilities for creating illusions. They meticulously arrange various objects (chairs, shirts, bottles of perfume) into compositions with a strongly two-dimensional or graphic quality. The result is an optical illusion: flat things become three-dimensional and vice versa. They do not present objects as everyday, marketable products, but manipulate them into building blocks for new compositions.

Essential to the work of Scheltens & Abbenes is the creative process in the studio where they construct their settings. It is an almost laboratory-like process, with the duo continually moving and adjusting items. They specifically opted to work in the field of both applied art and autonomous art, whereby each field serves as a culture medium for the other. A photograph’s autonomous artistic quality is always of foremost importance.

Maurice Scheltens (b. 1972, the Netherlands) and Liesbeth Abbenes (b. 1970, the Netherlands) are the sum total of a still-life photographer and the creative craftsmanship of an artist.

Technical perfection added to individual handicraft, strong pictorial clarity in addition to tailor-made settings. They experiment with converting spatial dimensions into flat surfaces and explore photography’s potential for creating illusion. Essential to their work is their laboratory like studio where they construct their settings with an attitude of conceptualisation and solution-led thinking, regardless of whether they are editing or tackling commissioned or independent artistic work.

Instead of presenting objects as plain sellable products, they often manipulate and utilize them as building blocks for new compositions. The autonomous artistic quality of the photograph always has to prevail. Scheltens & Abbenes deliberately choose to operate both in the field of applied and autonomous art and use them as breeding ground for one another. This approach resulted in showing their projects in cultural institutions such as Galliera Musee de la Mode Paris, Foam Amsterdam, Huis Marseille Amsterdam, The Kunsthal in Rotterdam and The Art Institute of Chicago.

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'Hidden Objects': by Scheltens & Abbenes, 2006