Tinka Pittoors / Eva Hesse

Eva Hesse

Seven Poles

1970

resin and fiber-glass, polyethylene, aluminum wire

272 x 240 cm

My first thought for this blog was: Eva Hesse, I have a soft spot for her since long ago. On the Internet I found an image that hit me like a bomb, because I had adored it so much before, and now, after forgetting it for almost 10 years, I rediscovered it, or rather I felt it again. Because it's crazy how such a work has become a piece of your DNA. I had not thought about it for such a long time, but when I saw it now: WOW.

It also reminded me of a recent installation that I made for CCMechelen: Irreligionair ...

Tinka Pittoors, 2017

Tinka Pittoors (BE)

Irreligionair

2017

installation, wood, paint, carpet, epoxy, inox, ink

ca 250 x 200 x 250 cm

http://www.tinkapittoors.com

Bas Ketelaars / Caspar David Friedrich

Caspar David Friedrich

Der Mönch am Meer

1808-1810

oil on canvas

110 x 171,5 cm

Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin

Looking at the paintings of Caspar David Friedrich I see atmosphere and structure. The Monk by the Sea (Der Mönch am Meer 1808-1810) is probably his most radical piece of work. This painting shows an overwhelming emptiness with the weight of the whole cosmos. More than just a landscape it shows nature in its most comprehensive form. Nature and its experience by the lonely figure in the foreground, of whom I can’t really tell whether he’s a part of it or not. 

Although it’s known that Friedrich painted his images rather quick and accurate after looking a long time at the empty canvas, in this picture you can still see the traces of two small fishing boats in the horizon which were eventually painted over. With this correction he brings pure abstraction suddenly very close by.  

For myself the works of Friedrich were one of the reasons to focus on landscape drawings. The one shown here is the first of a series of drawings in large format. In this drawing there’s a lot of trial and error, several systems are visible next to each other. The only part uncorrected is the foreground which is, just like you see often in Friedrich’s paintings, clearly distinct from the background. Yet together they produce the landscape.

Bas Ketelaars, 2017

Bas Ketelaars

Untitled (searching C.D.#1)

2013

graphite on paper

150 x 170 cm

collection AMC

www.basketelaars.nl

Ky Anderson / Kenneth Patchen

Kenneth Patchen

From the book The Walking Away World

Kenneth Patchen

From the book What Shall We Do Without Us, page 22

published 1984

Kenneth Patchen

From the book What Shall We Do Without Us, page 8

published 1984

Kenneth Patchen

From the book What Shall We Do Without Us, page 33

published 1984

Kenneth Patchen

Picture poem

Kenneth Patchen with a collection of his painted books

1957

I grew up in a family of artists so I was exposed to many types of art and artists. As a teenager I began to seek out art work that I felt moved by. My first art book purchase as a young artist, around 14 or 15 years old, was a book of painted poems titled 'What Shall We Do Without Us' by Kenneth Patchen. This was the perfect book for a teenage artist like myself. Full of passion, whimsy, playfulness while also being dead serious. The text of Patchen's poems meander through his paintings as if they are brushstrokes of color. I recognized his process of text and painting as a useful step for me to take as I worked towards abstract painting. Starting with the words and slowly removing them, letting the form, color and line become the words. His painted poems helped me to understand all that could be said with lines, form and color. 

Ky Anderson, 2017

Ky Anderson (US)

New Bridge

2017

acrylic and oil on canvas

81,3 x 76,2 cm

kyanderson.com

https://mwpm.wordpress.com/tag/kenneth-patchen/