In this exhibition, Rees introduces ‘Screaming in a bucket’, one of his most recent works. This polyester sculpture of a woman, bending forward with her head in a bucket, is based on a fantasy from Rees. There is a woman telling him: “Why don’t you put your head in a bucket, so that you can listen to your own screaming?” Rees transported that image to a realistic field. On the bucket you can find the Chinese character of Double Happiness, which is in conflict with the disturbing associations that the image evokes.
‘The road home’ and ‘Under my skin’ are two other pieces presented in this exhibition. Vigorous torsos made from porcelain are painted by other artists, invited by Rees, such as Hu Xin Ren, a Buddhist master who is specialized in over glaze painting and Wu Bin, a master in the famous Blue and White painting on raw porcelain in Jingdezhen, China.
Each sculpture from Rees carries a story of its own, sometimes leading us to the fantasy world where the beautiful and the horrible are confronted. The sculptures of Rees, whether designed for exhibition spaces or for public spaces, are characterized by its loftiness and its chromatic intensity. Working for more than two decades, Adriaan Rees has built an extensive list of works.