Two exhibitions
dal 21/4/2006 al 26/5/2006
Segnalato da
21/4/2006
Two exhibitions
Xavier Hufkens, Bruxelles
John Chamberlain twisted the cast steel parts of used cars into swollen concavities that simulated the casting of a more malleable medium such as clay. Painted with the romanticised aura of the past, figurative painting, Cris Brodahl’s works present exquisite and bizarre arrangements.
John Chamberlain
New Works
The famous American sculptor John Chamberlain (' 1927, Rochester, Indiana) presents a first solo exhibition at Xavier Hufkens with new sculptures only. The artist will exceptionally be in Brussels to attend the opening.
John Chamberlain began in 1957 to urge crushed and crumpled scraps of junked steel into volumes of subjective splendours whose brazen beauty called to the paintings of his forebear, Willem de Kooning. Chamberlain twisted and bent the cast steel parts of used cars into swollen concavities and convexities that simulated the casting of a more malleable medium such as clay…
Initially, the colour of the painted parts was that found in their salvaged state, most often, the palette of Detroit automakers. Later on Chamberlain has had the steel painted, on both sides, mostly in simple positive and negative figures…
John Chamberlain has never wanted his art to be restrained by a preset goal or the enactment of a specified task. While his procedures are clear, they are also excessive and impure. (Excerpts from Klaus Kertess, Chamberlain of Beauty, New York, 2003).
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Cris Brodahl
Electric Blue
Painted with the romanticised aura of the past and of traditional, figurative painting, Cris Brodahl (' 1963, Ghent)’s works present exquisite and bizarre arrangements. “Drawing from Surrealism as a departure point, Brodahl’s paintings are pieced together as stylised motifs, irrational and dream-like icons".
Cris Brodahl’s ‘portraits’ are both seductive and monstrous. Labyrinthine hairdos, touching patterns of entwined hands and a single pair of high heel shoes reveal a sensuous physicality. Elaborate still lifes including a heavy table cloth, meticulous parts of a skeleton and a reclining female head with an all-seeing eye suggest hidden and undescribable forces at work in our daily worlds. “Through her amalgamated forms, Brodahl envisions an image of fractured beauty; its placid but very controlled fabrication belying psychological unease.
In the new series of paintings, Brodahl used a ground layer of “electric blue" paint. Although most of this colour gets covered afterwards by the different layers of paints and imagery, Brodahl leaves open very small fragments within her composition that reveal the sharp blue at unexpected occasions.
Xavier Hufkens
rue Saint-Georges 6-8 - Bruxelles