Art piece of the month: Romy Finke, Untitled, 2001

The SCHUNCK collection, originally a collection of Dutch painting, is constantly developing and renewing itself, just like the world around it. In recent years, for instance, photography has also increasingly become a focal point within the collection policy with acquisitions by photographers such as Bertien van Manen (now on display in the museum), Alexander Basile, Lara Gasparotto and Martine Stig.

Romy Finke

However, the first acquisitions of photography date back to 1998-2004 and come from photographer Romy Finke (Schaesberg, 1961). So is this month's work: Untitled, 2001. Usually portrait photography is about the individual, but Finke manages to portray the person portrayed neutrally, without expression of her own, often with a detached gaze. Usually, the person portrayed looks straight into the camera; peculiarly, that is not the case in this work.

With her art, Finke focuses on the question of what constitutes a portrait and where the boundary lies between personal and characteristic on the one hand and general on the other. Although these are portraits that do not revolve around the individual, she is still looking for a specific personality, or perhaps rather, a way to emphasise or deny it precisely. After all, who are the two people in this picture, what occupies them?

Now on display

Would you like to take a closer look at the piece of art? It can be seen from Monday 28 August next in the exhibition The collection from then to now to ever in the Heerlen town hall. On the occasion of the opening of the new town hall, SCHUNCK presents a cross-section of the municipal art collection, with work by Yael Bartana, René Daniëls, Pieter Defesche, Hadassah Emmerich, Vera Gulikers, Ger Lataster and Keetje Mans, among others.