geukens & de vil contemporary art gallery antwerp knokke special events: UN-SCR-1325 power of drawing artists of the gallery:sophie kuijken carl andre ruben bellinkx stijn cole ilse d'hollander bert de beul michaël de kok peter de meyer toiracvintage-design masashi echigo herbert hamak gideon kiefer peter lindbergh sofie muller jaromir novotny daniel pitin
Ilse D’Hollander (°1968 - +1997)
What can one say or write about the final works by a young painter who in 1997 put an end to her life at the age of twenty-eight? Who during her lifetime had close contacts with Raoul De Keyser, one of her teachers, who had an obvious influence on her work. An artist who was under the spell of the painting medium, of which she wrote: ‘A painting arises out of the convergence of ideas and the act of painting itself’. And: ‘It is painting itself that always remains fundamental; with due regard for the person who is painting. The viewer who turns his gaze on my paintings remains even more fundamental.’ You can dismiss it quickly by talking about ‘epigones’ and thereby consider the matter closed.
But Ilse D’Hollanders’ work cannot be dealt with just like that. It has such a powerful presence, both qualitatively and quantitatively, that one cannot disregard it. Nor, for that matter, would one want to. The canvases she painted between 1995 and 1997 especially constitute a statement in which the main accent lies on both De Keyser’s influence (this is the last time we shall mention this name) and her own drive and personality.
One might refer to ‘lyrical abstraction’ in painting, which is a term people like to use in connection with Ilse D’Hollander’s work, as opposed to geometrical abstraction and abstract expressionism, but that is not the whole story. As far as the ‘lyrical’ is concerned, her work is so markedly controlled and huis clos that this word is not all appropriate. The word abstract also raises questions: not that much recognisable figuration is concealed in these paintings, yet there are nevertheless references to landscapes (or parts of them), to identifiable motifs from, for example, a meadow landscape in Flanders. And even ‘expressionism’ is a bridge too far, once again precisely because of the restrained and economical nature of her work.
D’Hollander’s paintings create a transcendent world with their vertical and horizontal strips, their rigid and flowing lines, brushstrokes and finger marks, greyish and subdued colours, and layers and colours of paint that gleam through the surface from deep down. It is painfully obvious how much D’Hollander needed to suppress her tormented thoughts and to channel them into these small canvases, which look like sublimated moments of tranquillity. In these final works it is as if she has truly emptied herself into her paintings.
But this must also have included plenty of occasions involving ‘the pleasure of painting’. In the way horizontal and vertical bands were painted, sometimes in several colours on top of each other; in the way rigid lines were alternated with a lighter, dancing touch; in the way the colours used were mainly pastel tints, while never giving the impression of conformism or banality.
One explanation lies in the view that Ilse D’Hollander took regarding ‘the character’ in her work. She often painted one coat over another in interacting lines and planes, thereby suggesting a ‘figure’ with an undeniable but barely definable presence. She saw this figure as a character who, she wrote, ‘expresses the reason for his own painted existence. The character tells us something about the painting, while what is painted tells us about the character.’ In this way D’Hollander indicated sublimely what she was essentially engaged in: a fundamental type of painting in which she avoided any form of anecdote and obsessively left the painting hand free to sublimate every piece of work into a fully independent ‘image’ that surrenders totally to the viewer in order to be looked at, interpreted and judged. It seems she took this to such lengths that she utterly effaced herself as an artist.
Marc Ruyters December 2009Translation Gregory Ball
