JEANNET ISKANDAR TRANS FORM

“Jeannet Iskandar feeds our desire and our capacity for astonishment…. She is a young artist whose work relentlessly astonishes us. How she proves herself capable of this metaphysical undertaking is by being brutally honest..and sure…that the work always…(first & foremost) astonishes herself.” Jack Wax VCUarts, Richmond, VA

Danish artist Jeannet Iskandar’s work seems to be governed by a dialectical monism, which holds that reality is ultimately a unified whole. In her practice she orders loose, undulating, outwardly radiating parts of hand blown glass tubing into sparse geometric forms. In doing so she brings the complementary polarities of complex elements into the essential unity of a simple form.

Iskandar says her work is inspired by the mathematical constant Π (Pi) and Maurice Ravel’s Bolero. “The rhythm, repetition, and all the fine diversities and small variations that contribute to the nuances in the experience of these two different ‘constructs’ fascinate me,” she writes. “They both somehow expand with each sequence added, yet each sequence contributes to the same basic pattern, which makes the expression calm and whole.”

The pieces in TRANS FORM, Iskandar’s first solo show in New York, are all round (spheres, ovoids and capsules) and translucent with occasional muted color elements, which give their surfaces the appearance of a hi-tech winter camouflage. Their milky, light-emanating centers seem to push forth parts that are simultaneously opening and closing. This culminates in an illusion of depth and motion that leaves viewers with a sense of the pieces breathing and expanding. It is as if we hold them together with our gaze.

Jeannet Iskandar received her degree from the Glass & Ceramic School in Bornholm, Denmark (now part DKDS (Danish Design School) Bornholm) and built her own advanced studies program by apprenticing and taking classes with many other artists whose practice incorporates glass, such as Jack Wax, Tobias Mohl, Trine Drivsholm, Steffen Dam, Micha Karlslund, Julius Weiland, and served as a teaching assistant for Susanne Johnsen at Haystack Mountain School of Craft, Charlotte La Cour and others. Iskandar is a recipient of the 2010 Danish State Art Fund (Statens Kunstfond) grant. Her work has been shown in galleries in the US and Europe as well at the Bornholms Kunstmuseum and the Cisternerne Museet in Denmark and the Design Center in Malmo, Sweden.