Dissonance + Harmony: Hanna Ten Doornkaat

Working predominantly in graphite, Hanna ten Doornkaat's work is an ongoing investigation into the meaning and concept of drawing. Her practice is defined by a complex process of repetitive mark making and erasure, of revealing and concealing. Layers bear witness to the tension between silent contemplation and the cacophony of modern life, the spaces between as noteworthy as the lines themselves.

In preparation of her solo exhibition with &Gallery the artist revisited formal line drawings on solid board and placed these in dialogue with the more amorphous aesthetic of works created within the constraints of last year's lockdown. Initially trained in sculpture, ten Doornkaat not only questions the purity of abstracted lines and shapes, but also challenges the boundaries between two and three dimensions - always in pursuit of a balance between dissonance and harmony. 

The process of drawing with a variety of media is more a means to an idea, therefore both the idea

and the process are equally important. The act of accumulating lines closely together to cover a

surface might seem like a rigid automatism but it is more like a ritual and the eventual translation of

an idea. It is the partial removal and repetition over and over again, leaving traces, which is a very

important part of my work and that is what I consider a space in-between. The silences between a

line or visible absence, the point where the line finishes but is taken further in the mind of the

viewer . This means that a lot of my works, especially the more recent ones, can be completed by

the viewer’s mind in a variety of ways.