ANTWERP.- In Tina Gillen's work, space is rarely neutral. Her paintings bear traces of landscapes, structures, objects and moods, but they cannot be easily interpreted. They evoke a sense of closeness and, at the same time, distance. They elicit recognition and, at the same time, a strangeness that needs no explanation. Gillen does not construct explanatory images, but paints situations that are in motion, spatially, psychologically, inwardly.

The exhibition “The Places We Carry” is based on the idea that a landscape is not only something external, but also a carrier of inner time. Gillen's paintings often arise from observations of the environment, near or far, but those observations are never purely visual. They are coloured by memory, dreams, current events and emotion. In her practice, personal images, news flashes, intuitive impressions and mental projections overlap. They permeate the painting process, but without taking centre stage. The paintings remain silent about their origins; they breathe suggestion.

The title “The Places We Carry” refers to the way in which we not only inhabit space, but also carry it with us. Some places, whether tangible or mental, nestle in our memory, leave their mark, and return at unexpected moments. These places are not unambiguous. They can evoke both security and unrest, and be both collective and extremely personal. Gillen's recent practice increasingly moves along that boundary: between the private and the shared, the visible and the intangible, the current and the inner.

Although her work is not explicitly political, the world seeps in through her involvement in global movements: migration, loss, displacement, memory. The mourning of personal losses, like a silent undercurrent, has also fuelled her work recently. But never as a theme. Rather as a shift in tone, in resonance, in the way the image breathes.