ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
During the months of June and July, nine galleries of the Amsterdam Jordaan district will join forces for the second time to organize Nieuw Amsterdams Peil (N.A.P.) featuring work by Koen van den Broek. This year, the exhibition will be curated by Joost Declercq, director of the Belgian Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens and Charlotte Crevits, curator of Dhondt-Dhaenens. For this second edition, Declercq is selecting one artist per gallery, to be paired with one or two Belgian artist(s) not represented by a gallery in the Netherlands. Through coupling these artists, Declercq is putting them in the spotlights as well as providing the galleries with a link to foreign partners through international collaborations.
Artists exhibiting at Galerie Ron Mandos: Bouke de Vries (NL, 1960) Koen van den Broek (BE, 1973) Edith Dekyndt (BE, 1960)
Veracht den burgerman, doch ledig zijne kruiken. Despise the solid burgher, but drink deep from his flagon.
Participating galleries: andriesse ~ eyck gallery, Annet Gelink Gallery, Ellen de Bruijne Projects, GRIMM, Galerie Ron Mandos, Stigter Van Doesburg, tegenboschvanreden, Galerie Fons Welters, Martin van Zomeren
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About the artist: Koen van den Broek (guest artist)
The work of the Belgian painter Koen van den Broek (1973, Bree BE) draws heavily on the imagery found in America’s urban landscapes. The artist photographs a slice of reality, which he then transforms into a painting. The process of painting renders the image more abstract: details are accentuated, superfluous elements ignored, light and shadow heightened. Perspectival lines and planes of colour break free from photographed reality to create a new pictorial tension. The abstracted image is particularly radical in two series: Flock, and Bird. This strategy infuses his oeuvre with echoes of the American wasteland, as much as it references the work of painters like Henri Matisse, Clyfford Still and Franz Kline.