Hans Op De Beeck in Wonderland

With his artistic practice, the artist investigates some universal questions of our contemporary complex society such as the meaning of life and the human mortality.

“It would be nice if the beauty of mortality could be celebrated. To see this loss as something that is an implicit part of our human condition.”

Biography

Hans Op de Beeck was born in Turnhout in 1969. He has a Masters degree in Visual Arts. He actually lives and works in Brussels and Gooik, in Belgium. Op de Beeck has shown his work extensively in both institutional solo and group exhibitions around the world. His works have been presented in numerous venues such as the Venice Biennale in Italy, the Shanghai Biennale and the Art Summer University at Tate Modern in London.

Hans Op de Beeck’s artworks include large installations, sculptures, animated films, video works, drawings, paintings, short stories, photographs and new media. His artworks want to recreate a true experience for the viewer so that, he stimulate audiences’ senses with his visual images creating introspective sensations. With his artistic practice, he tries to investigate some universal question in our contemporary complex society such as the meaning of life and the human mortality. His subjects are related to the way in which men live their surrounding environment and how their surrounding stages both festive and tragic moments, particularly in recurring home rituals. For the artist, man lives in this “double-trouble” and he stages the world as he was the main character of a tragicomic theatrical piece.

Emblematic Projects

Silent Library (2016)

Silent Library is one of his sculptural installations that completely shoot the audience into an immersive and introspective world made of soft, white, plaster-coated objects. This parallel universe is made of books, plants, framed paintings, figures, and animals and was presented during Frieze London 2016. With Silent Library, the audience is completely immersed in a both peaceful and melancholy space where they can experience pleasure or uncomfortable sensations. Home rituals and lonely daydreams reflecting festive and tragic moments recur in Hans Op de Beeck’s research.

Another example of the reflection on this double image created by our contemporary surrounding is the 2010 A House by the Sea. A room has hosted this monochrome house surrounded by drawings of lands and seascapes. Again, the audience was able to experience from a banal to the most serious emotions.

The Garden of Whispers

In The Garden of Whispers, the Belgian artist wants to stimulate audience’s sense through the creation of a multi-sensory sculptural installation in the refectory of a Jacobian convent in Toulouse during the Printemps de September Festival. The viewer is invited to enter inside the meditative space and go through sand dunes, camping outposts with barren trees, where just a simple small light mark the route. In this context, the audience feels visual olfactory and auditory experiences. Here, the tragi-comic way in which the man stages the world is recurring again. A timeless experience is, thus, recreated.

At a certain point, space seems to be completely filled, due to a soundtrack which releases whispering voices. When the soundtrack stops, the audience experiences an empty space. Pots, pans, glass bottles and bedding greets visitors into space. An incorporated performance was created involving figures acting in mundane ways and offering tea to spectators.

While audience could find references to mythology, religion, and history written in small tableaus all over the space, they will find themselves to be simply part of an inhabited space or a land recently abandoned. At the end, it is just a matter of visitors’ interpretation and imagination. That is what the artist wants his artworks to be experienced.

Some Exhibitions

(2017) Espace 104, Paris, Espace 104, Paris, FR The Silent Castle, Museum Insel

(2017) Hombroich, Leverkusen, DE Out of the Ordinary, Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg,

(2017) Wolfsburg, DE The Lily Pond, Tongeren, BE

(2016) Silent Rooms, Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna, AU

(2016) Small Things and Soothing Thoughts, Galleria Continua, San Gimignano, IT

(2016) The Collector’s House, Art Unlimited, Basel, CH

(2016) Night Time, Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden, Wiesbaden, DE