Marcelle Hanselaar

Etchings with aquatint

Marcelle Hanselaar's new exhibition is a series of 18 etchings with aquatint. This new series of prints takes its inspiration from a collection of travel books dating back to the 17th and 18th century.

Travellers' observations

From those books, which were an inheritance from her father's own collection (he was an antiquarian book-seller in The Hague) – Marcelle Hanselaar draws on vignettes or snippets extracted from travellers' observations and gives her own response to the strange and foreign customs they describe. Hanselaar has translated these travellers' tales inwardly, and in her exhibition, "La Petite Mort", urges the viewer to join her in a curious voyage through unsettling glimpses of rough seas and private scenes of a very different kind than the sojourns one would expect or anticipate. An opportunity is given for us to peep as a stagehand would, through a curtain or chink in the floorboards at the action. Scenes are played out as you turn the pages of text then image.

La Petite Mort

Extracts from these books have been chosen and printed on Korean paper to accompany the etchings with chine collé, printed on Somerset paper. Eighteen prints, the first five sets of the edition have been presented in two separate boxes. The first box is called 'Notes from an Incomplete Journey' and consists of a dark grey cloth box, 32 x 38 cms., containing a title page, five text sheets and five of the etchings. The second box, "La Petite Mort" contains a title page and ten etchings. All prints can be bought individually, framed or unframed. The size of the edition is 30.

Successful exhibition

Marcelle Hanselaar has recently had a highly successful exhibition of her work in Belgium. At present Marcelle Hanselaar is showing in 'Uncanny Tales', a touring exhibition from the Netherlands to regional galleries in the UK in the company of Paula Rego, Ana Maria Pacheco and Oona Grimes.
East West will show Hanselaar's paintings in September 2005 (with Sadie Lee and Laurie Lipton) under the exhibition title "Unladylike". This is the first time East West has had an exhibition exclusively of prints since 1992 when we exhibited Arthur Boyd's prints.
East West Gallery, 8 Blenheim Crescent, London W11 1NN Gallery Opening Hours Wednesday - Saturday 10 - 6 pm