KEES GOUDZWAARD

The paintings by Kees Goudzwaard are bright, controlled and hide any emotional presence of its maker. Being a Dutch painter, Goudzwaard can’t deny the influence of Dutch Modernism. Especially De Stijl was inspiring for the development of his oeuvre. Each painting by Goudzwaard is based on a model. He combines colored paper, transparent acetates and tape just the way a collage would be organized. It’s a slow process of shifts and superpositions. Scale, color, form and composition challenge each other on a formal level. Goudzwaard acts according to his own logic. Finally he aims for a balance between all the components of the painting. In ‘Slow Rocking’ and ‘Collected’ we recognize the discipline and the almost mathematical structuring of the surface as we see in earlier work. This in contrast to the more playful, organic and open composition in ‘Grisaille’, ‘Study’ & ‘Assembling the Smaller Parts’. In those works the borders determine the tension within the painting.

Solo exhibitions by Kees Goudzwaard where installed at S.M.A.K. in Ghent, Culturgest in Lisbon, the Museum of Modern Art in Arnhem and at the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam. In 2003 he was invited to create a site-specific installation in Mexico City. His work was part of group exhibitions at Kröller-Müller Museum in Otterlo, Museum Kunst Palast in Düsseldorf, Roger Raveel Museum in Machelen-Zulte, Ecole des Beaux Art in Paris, Lokaal 01 in Breda, De Vleeshal in Middelburg and Castillo Corrales in Paris. Last year his work was included in the Biennial for Contemporary Art in Rennes.

BART STOLLE

Time and motion, that’s the start of the oeuvre of the young Belgian artist Bart Stolle (°1974). In the eighties he experienced as a teenager the introduction of commercial television and how images accumulate. Especially the personal computer and the internet change the gaze and the references. Since the invention of smart phones and tablets contemplation becomes even more difficult. Our society is saturated by speed, information and high-tec. Stolle investigates this phenomenon and choses to slow down. He focuses, mingles and (re)constructs. This leads to an oeuvre hold together under the flag ‘Low Fixed Media Show’, an advertising agency for himself or an alternative entertainment company. Despite all evolutions, Stolle is still convinced human beings dominate the machine. Creativity is a human thing that’s currently not mechanical. Stolle observes the world and translate it into humorous animations in which human figures are reduced to an arrangement of geometrical forms. Handicraft is high valued. He doesn’t want to pass on calculations to the computer. He prefers an intensive stop-motion practice over the input of parameters.

The same happens when Stolle paints, when he makes a static image. The result is a slow construction of essential units. Here we notice the influence of Modernism. Especially De Stijl, Suprematism with Malevich and the work by Kandinsky animate him. The personal alphabet of forms and colors Stolle creates is a means to express larger structures without illustrating them. He investigates the similarities between the logic of a computer and of a human and analyzes different society structures. Also his interest in communication systems, music, science, architecture and urbanization echoes through his oeuvre. He reconciles poles such as the virtual with reality, black with white, the organic with mechanics and so on. As much interesting for Stolle is the moment where the viewer attempts to put his images into words. Poetry, philosophy and fantasy emerge while translating.

Solo exhibitions by Bart Stolle were on view in S.M.A.K. in Ghent, De Brakke Grond in Amsterdam and STUK in Leuven. He was invited for group shows at MUHKA in Antwerp, De Loketten of the Flemish Parliament in Brussels, Coup de Ville in Sint-Niklaas, Buda Art center in Kortrijk, Centrum for Contemporary Art in Warsaw and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Shanghai.

JACK WHITTEN

Beginning of the seventies Jack Whitten (°1932) makes a decision that determines his complete oeuvre. He takes a distance of Abstract Expressionism, a movement that inspired him strongly during his years at Cooper Union in New York. He interchanges brush and figuration for instruments and abstraction. From that moment on a painting is no longer painted but constructed. Whitten investigates the characteristics of acrylic by boiling it, freezing it, laminating it, crushing it, casting it and spreading it all over. After collecting all his material and his tools, he starts building up the image as a collage. Since the eighties the sculptural and topographical quality of his paintings rises. His works on paper are always ahead of his paintings. He works with the concept of ‘working drawings’. The painting is not an illustration of an idea nor is the painting a reproduction of a drawing. The drawings operate as scouts always advancing ahead using process to search for new possibilities. Process as subject matter gives him a freedom to explore uncharted territory. In his work he reflects about philosophy, science, technology and use it as a mean to honor and commemorate people. Whitten’s abstract paintings aren’t cold, geometrical, anonymous and predictable. They are innovative, full of live, directed by controlled coincidences and strive for universality.

Work by Jack Whitten was part of important exhibitions such as the ‘Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting’ (1969,1972) in the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and ‘Afro-American Abstraction: An Exhibition of Contemporary painting and sculpture by Nineteen Black American Artists’ (1980) organized by the Institute for Art and Urban Resources and MoMA P.S.1 Center for Contemporary Arts in New York. In 1974 he got his first solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. More recently MoMA P.S.1 Center of Contemporary Arts in New York and Atlanta Contemporary Art Center organized a solo exhibition. The Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego is preparing a retrospective for 2014.

His work is in the collection of museums amongst which Museum for Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, Whitney Museum in New York, Studio Museum in Harlem, Metropolitan Museum in New York, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Museum for Contemporary Art Chicago, Dallas Museum of Art and Tate Modern in London.