Paul Casaer: All we can get

De Garage - 25.09.2021 - 21.11.2021

All we can get, the title of Paul Casaer’s exhibition at De Garage, can be read in several ways. Inspired by those all-you-can-eatformulas in restaurants, the title denounces our human greed and thirst for ever more. Greed and consumerism seem to be controlling forces in contemporary society. All our needs are met, and yet there remains a nagging sense of emptiness. Is that all there is? Is this all we can get?

Artist Paul Casaer observes and captures our ambivalent world and mankind in the grip of confusion. At De Garage, his keen observations result in a complex and inventive exhibition, which he presents as a kind of theme park. But with little entertainment to be had. The artist investigates what lies beneath the surface of our consumer-focused society. His work questions the way we try to give meaningful connections to objects, our environment and our world.

The use of everyday objects and structures, often referring to all manner of cultural achievements, ensures that Paul Casaer's work often appears recognisable, clear and accessible. Sometimes the combination and arrangement of objects seems complacent and almost natural. In other instances, the composition of objects grates and chafes, precluding any logical or obvious connection. The sculptures seem to be full of tension, charged as they are with multiple connotations.

As a sculptor, Casaer designs his own artistic universe in which new connections emerge and where things can find themselves in a place where they don't usually belong. By aligning objects and themes, changes of scale and using both real objects and representations, he creates new meanings and connections. Like a master stylist, he succeeds in giving his art a certain elusive quality. Paul Casaer looks at the future as it is revealed in the present moment.