Jim Campers photo Dani Gherca
Artist

Jim Campers

Graduation year

2023

Nationality

Belgium
Psilocybin Cubensis framed
Psilocybin Cubensis, 2017. Archival pigment print, 40 x50cm

My work could be described as a complex web of references and associations. It is highly varied in style: some of my images resemble scientific illustrations, travel journals or documentary, while others recall advertisements or experiments with avant-garde abstraction. Yet not a single work is non-committal. Research plays an essential part in the way I approach my subjects and choose the geographical locations for my photographs. Genres and styles are mixed, instituting a way of working with images where the world is explored through analogy and association, rather than through objective (or scientific) description. Images that are more open to interpretation, that are prone to establish a dialogue with the audience instead of merely informing them from a singular viewpoint. It’s a certain reluctance toward a tightly controlled message and the explicit desire to leave room for the viewer, who has to develop his own understanding of what these images mean. Rather than stating an indisputable conviction, these images want to start a conversation. This conversation starts between the works themselves who entertain a lively discussion with each other and then spills over to the viewer whose task it has become to make sense of their quarrels and agreements.

The scenography of my exhibitions is specifically created and built by myself for the particular exhibition site and can be viewed as an installation in itself. A labyrinthine mise-en-scène, it creates a setting in which the visitor can get lost, encountering specific yet variable combinations of works while moving through the exhibition space. It intensifies the viewing experience, and it invites you to look actively and to forge connections. I employed this kind of scenography for the first time in a group exhibition (In the wake of his surrounding, he fades, Extra City 2016) and it has since then become my standard mode of presentation.

Featured events

HISK Open Studios 2022

Open Studios 2022

13/05/2022 16/05/2022
Hoger Instituut Voor Schone Kunsten, Gent, BE HISK - Open Studios
Websitebanners De Tien5

De Tien

20/09/2022 31/03/2023
M Leuven, Leuven, BE Exhibition
IMG 2477

Being more honest about the process

23/09/2022 30/09/2022
Frans Masereel Centrum, Kasterlee, BE HISK - Workshop
Posterfinalstayinginthegap

Staying in the Gap

20/01/2023 05/02/2023
Société d'Electricité, 1080 Brussel, BE HISK - Exhibition
Schermafbeelding 2023 01 31 om 15 12 36

HISK Edition 2022

29/01/2023
HISK, Gabrielle Petitstraat 4-6, Brussel, BE HISK - News
Worldlines 100

Worldlines #1

22/04/2023 - 16:00 20:00
HISK - Hoger Instituut Voor Schone Kunsten, Brussel, BE Happening
Website 1

Open Studios 2023

12/05/2023 15/05/2023
HISK - Hoger Instituut Voor Schone Kunsten, Brussel, BE HISK - Open Studios
Postkaart SB55 1

Jim Campers. Across Realtime

04/06/2023 - 14:00 20:00
Salon Blanc, Oostende, BE Exhibition
Frans Masereel Centrum, 2022
Frans Masereel Centrum, Kasterlee, BE HISK - Workshop
Worldlines 100

Worldlines

23/11/2023 17/12/2023
Hoger Instituut Voor Schone Kunsten - Vlaanderen, Gabrielle Petitstraat, Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, België HISK - Laureates Exhibition