Sunday Paul Kooiker Photography

sunday. Paul Kooiker
Published by van Zoetendaal 2011, isbn/ean 9789072532077
size 24 x 34 cm, pages 84, edition 1000

The spirit of Hans Bellmer lives in the twenty first century in Kooiker’s monograph Sunday. These limpid outdoor photographs capture a naked fat woman wearing high heels, her white body so bleached that her genitalia are invisible, rendering her doll-like. 

She poses, faceless, in positions that are sometimes sexual, sometimes motionless and morbid. Around her is a back garden, with a homemade dais for her to pose on, and views of dark trees and bushes with blood-red leaves. 

Kooiker uses his contemporary technique to create an oblique, threatening, somehow vintage atmosphere. 

Paul Kooiker (1964) was born in Rotterdam but lives and works in Amsterdam. He studied at the Royal Academy of Arts in The Hague and at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam. Since 1995 he has been teaching at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. In 1996 he won the Prix de Rome and in 2009 he was awarded the A. Roland Holst Prize for his oeuvre. Paul Kooiker's work has been exhibited widely. Among his group shows since 1996 have been those held at Maison Européene de la photographie, Paris; Fotohof, Salzburg; Kumho Art Museum, Seoul; Arsenale Novissimo, Venice; Zabludowicz Collection, London. Solo exhibitions since 1996 include those held at Kunsthal, Rotterdam; Vleeshal, Middelburg; James Cohan Gallery, New York; Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, Foam Fotografi emuseum, Amsterdam; Gemeentemuseum, The Hague; Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam. Paul Kooiker has published six books:Utrecht Goitre (1999), Hunting and Fishing (1999), Showground (2004) (see review Claxton Projects) , Seminar (2006) Room Service (2008) and Crush (2009). Between 2007 and 2009 he published fourteen issues of Archivo, a bi-monthly photo journal curated by himself and gallerist Willem van Zoetendaal. In his work Paul Kooiker explores various aspects of the theme of looking: voyeurism, shame and distance. His work can be seen as a continuation of an old tradition focusing on the relationship between the artist and the model, the observer and the observed. Kooiker's obsessive collections of images confuse, humiliate and unnerve. They raise questions about a photographer's reason for looking at things and the motivation behind photographing something. The artist plays a game with the viewer, who is confronted with his or her own gaze.