A New Territory

Isolde Kille: The Land of the Lilies at Uncool Gallery, Brooklyn

The experience of abstraction, when it’s called by that term, tends to be over-intellectualized and cedes from common judgment into an ether of academic argument. Yet the true nature of such engagement is anything but academic at its core. What is most essential to this experience is the exact opposite–a dearth of judgment, and a willingness to absorb that qualities that construct the degree of encounter on hand. Such experiences feed a native curiosity, even as they simultaneously evade definition. In Isolde Kille’s recent installation, The Land of the Lilies, she plays with associations that originate in certain elemental qualities dictated by the forms and imagery she employs, which take on a talismanic character and inhabit ambiguous spaces that elicit an ancient redolence. 

All of the artworks in Kille’s exhibition, or most of them, are covered in shards of broken mirrors or circular cutout from a mirrored material that provide a porous and reflective aspect to each esthetic encounter. We do not merely look at these works but are stared back at, reflecting ourselves infinitely into the perceptive interval. This creates a phenomenological disconnect that complicates immediate justification. The painted areas of these works, which are grommeted and in some cases hang from chains affixed to the ceiling. 

The various works that comprise this installation represent a sea change in the formal positioning of Kille’s creative intent. All of the different pieces here own their idiosyncrasy, compelling the viewer to enter a labyrinth of encounters rather than a stately exhibition with parts delineated, measured, and priced. Their given  names express a state of existence rather than a clever word game, or an escape into untitled meaning: Sun, Lily, Garden, Balance, Cosmos, Ring of Fire. 

The Land of the Lilies presents  an alternate reality in which nothing has a true name, only a nature that can be converted according to whatever meaning is required of it. If it’s to have any active reference, this would be a means of interpreting the physical environment of the locale Kille calls home, Abiquiu, New Mexico, a territory with dimensions of meaning that relate to one of its most famous past residents, the painter Georgia O’Keefe, an iconic figure whose presence is still felt.  There is a sense of being thrust back in time, before civilizations; one in which the reflection upon the immutable results in the most peremptory images of a world filled with belief. Kille has transformed the bedrock of her formal intention from a construction of abstract meaning into a constellation of embodied events masquerading as paintings and sculptures. She takes us along on her inner journey, and what the horizon promises will only have a name when we arrive. 

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Uncool Gallery, an integral part of the Uncool Artist Community, is an artist-run space led by artists who believe that our true strength and uniqueness, both as creators and individuals, arise from unapologetic experimentation and sincere collaboration.