Sun Tan

Thinking the exhibition from IKOB’s neighbouring tanning salon, artist duo CMMC looked at the ingredients that go into artificial tanning. Transmitting energy, six educational solar motors are presented on demounted ceiling lights, alongside a stem of aloe vera in a metal holder, a hint of sunscreen scent in the elevator, three cartons of solar milk and a spray tan tag on the museum wall. There is a newspaper fragment on a swallowable medicinal robot and next to it an article on energy storage for future decades — it is framed and protected by UV glass. Sun Tan explores solar power as energy and affect. CMMC is an artist duo focused on performance. Somewhere between strongly intuitive and oddly constructed, their practice combines language and doubt. Often driven by questions on (expected) skill, CMMC works with duration, quickly alternating emotions and long recitations. Over the years their work evolved to more stylized conceptual responses to the invitations they receive; from a 6 hour a day massage for 4 days in a row in a museum; to trying to write a novella in three days on sugar and water in the exhibition; to declaring entangled trees on the premises of an institution, a performance of their making. CMMC (Céline Mathieu and Myrthe Christianne van der Mark, 1989, BE and NL) performed in galleries and at art fairs internationally in Berlin (Berlin Art Week), Hamburg (P/ART), Manchester (Manchester Contemporary, Castlefield Gallery), Rotterdam (Wo Meine Sonne Scheint) and in Antwerp (M HKA, Kunsthal Extra City, Trampoline gallery), Leuven (Museum M), Ghent (Publiek Park, Vooruit, KIOSK), and Brussels (Poppositions). For their residency at AIR Berlin Alexanderplatz, they were supported by the Flemish Government.