The portraits in the series are about “chance” encounters, or rather, they are the result of such encounters. The still lifes are accumulated objects found in the studio. The exhibition raises the question of chance. The people I invited to the studio were sometimes strangers and sometimes friends. But there always turned out to be several “chance” connections. The combination of “Lucky” and “Chance” is also an invitation to reflect on “opportunity”, “chance” and “luck” in relation to morality. The return of animals in the works invites us to reflect on our place alongside animals. If humans have always placed themselves above or outside the causal order because of their rationality, then this exhibition is about the realisation that it is more likely to be otherwise. We could also have been born as pigs. The pig is placed in the centre and feeds its young in the painting. A man is pushed away on the right-hand side of the work. He is Odysseus' father, Laertes, to whom the pig is given as a gift when Odysseus sees his father again after his many wanderings. Here, the focus is on the pig and how we view the animal rather than the narrative of the Odyssey. Pigs are also animals that are believed to have access to the underworld. In ancient Greece, black pigs were often sacrificed to the gods of the underworld. The pig is chthonic. It is connected to the gods and spirits of the earth and the underworld.
This raises questions about Enlightenment thinking, which places rationality above the body, above emotions, and above animals. Human freedom is said to exist in reason, that instrument that distinguishes us from the earth and the determined universe. In my work, I like to reverse that schema and propose the body, or the recognition of it, as a condition of freedom. Lucky Chance is also a title that presents itself as somewhat “aloof”. It is a vague combination, because being “lucky” is always a matter of “chance”. The title should convey a kind of playful modesty.

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