Melvin Moti: From Dust to Dust

With the eye of an amateur detective-historian, and working with an intensity and slowness that is rare among artists of his generation, Dutch artist Melvin Moti (b. 1977) gives form to obscure anecdotes, incidents, and individuals—“black holes” that, as he says, “haven't been contextualized by official historiography.” For his first solo show in Belgium, Moti puts failure and dust at the center of a new project that is over one year in the making. WIELS will host Moti’s sparse constellation of objects and evocations. What, you might ask, does failure, a knighted 18th century painter, two absurd inventors, a fabric-lined room, elaborately ornamental display structures, and the patterns of organized dust have to do with each other? The answer is neither given nor simple. Yet through it all, the artist could be said to do something that is less about showing a series of related artworks or constructing an exhibition of thematic or rational relationships, and more about attempting to construct the conditions for an experience that, like dust, will be fleeting and evasive, but nevertheless attempts to leave a mark.

Moti’s work has been shown internationally, including solo exhibitions at the Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam; FRAC Champagne Ardenne, Reims; and Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, as well as being featured at the 5th Berlin Biennial; Wattis Institute, San Francisco; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; 9th Baltic Triennial; and Witte de With, Rotterdam, among others.

Curated by WIELS associate curator, Elena Filipovic
Co-production: Fondazione Galleria Civica – Centro di Ricerca sulla Contemporaneità of Trento