Uit het atelier van Klaus Baumgärtner (From Klaus Baumgärtner’s Studio); Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

What imagination and therefore art can do, is far less obvious in the glittering spectacles made to entertain us, than in the sometimes very small gestures and shapes of our daily lives.

Klaus Baumgärtner (1948-2013) based his work on the latter.

He saw the possibilities of found objects, pieces of different materials, plants, wood, found footage, light and shading, to put his (and our) imagination into operation.

I think that was not a matter of modesty, but of a very vivid interest in how shapes and gestures communicate.

Presently you can see works by Baumgärtner at Galerie Ramakers, delicate, not always in shape, but certainly in thought and concept.

The gestures are not just in the bending twigs and branches or in the curvature of shapes and lines, but also in the way of Baumgärtner’s composing and thinking.

It is about the sheer joy of seeing, conceiving and making the objects and they are never just funny jokes.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2018

Content of all photographs courtesy to Galerie Ramakers, Den Haag

Bertus Pieters

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Ton of Holland, Medical Body Jewels; Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

With collages, embroidery and paint Ton of Holland (Ton Hoogerwerf, 1956) shows in Galerie Ramakers works in which the usually somewhat obnoxious world of disease becomes a world of symbolism and a kind of decadent aesthetics.

He does so unabashedly and with a sense of humour through which an understanding of the realities of our lives as biological creatures is felt.

It is fun, beautiful and maybe a bit painful.

The show is in its last week, so hurry up to see it all in real/unreal!

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

©Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all photographs courtesy to Ton of Holland and Galrie Ramakers, Den Haag.

 

Bertus Pieters

Michel Hoogervorst, studio visit, The Hague

During his exhibition Guess Things Happen That Way at Galerie Ramakers (click here for some pictures of that show), Michel Hoogervorst (1961) has opened his studio over the weekends. So i visited him last Sunday.

The studio is in one of the many late 19^th century apartments in my own neighbourhood, so it was a visit just round the corner.

Apart from seeing his works in a studio setting, you can also admire a big wall painting which he changes almost completely every week.

Almost, as some details are maintained.

It is like the growing process he often shows in his paintings: there is an end to it and also the wall painting’s last version will disappear.

Happily some accurate photographs of the different versions have been made.

Things happen that way too.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all pictures courtesy to Michel Hoogervorst

 

Bertus Pieters

Michel Hoogervorst, Guess Things Happen That Way; Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

Some artists need the whole world to give expression to their ideas, others need no more than their daily lives in which flowers in a pot on a shelf and some common words are enough.

Michel Hoogervorst (1961) belongs to the latter.

To quote the title of his present show at Galerie Ramakers, i too guess things just happen that way.

He draws the consequences of his daily existence and that opens a whole world to him and to the viewer.

Measuring from the diversity, quality and quantity of the works on show, which are all recent to very recent, it gives him an almost infinite inspiration.

Such that the exhibition has expanded to his studio where he welcomes visitors in the weekends during the show.

I’ll probably report about that later.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all photographs courtesy to Michel Hoogervorst and Galerie Ramakers, Den Haag

 

Bertus Pieters

Willy De Sauter; Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

Flemish artist Willy De Sauter (1938) presently has his first solo exhibition at Galerie Ramakers. Ramakers shows older and newer works.

Within the framework of geometric abstract compositions De Sauter offers a lot of liberty and space for reflection.

Some works are softened in their outlook by the use of chalk which, in a way, gives them a sense of humaneness.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all pictures courtesy to Willy De Sauter and Galerie Ramakers, Den Haag

 

Bertus Pieters

Quand la nature s’éveille (When Nature Awakens); Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

Reinier Lagendijk

Galerie Ramakers says goodbye to winter with a trio exhibition, showing

Reinier Lagendijk

sculptures by Reinier Lagendijk,

Joncquil

paintings by Joncquil and

Eelco Brand

Eelco Brand

animations by Eelco Brand.

Reinier Lagendijk

Reinier Lagendijk

Lagendijk’s sculptures and installations bring shapes and ways of growing that are both unexpected and seemingly natural.

Joncquil

Joncquil

Joncquil

Joncquil

Joncquil

In Joncquil’s paintings anecdotes seem to be on the verge of their concluding phase.

Reinier Lagendijk

Reinier Lagendijk

Eelco Brand

Eelco Brand

Eelco Brand

Eelco Brand

Brand’s meticulously made animations never reach their concluding phase, running their cycles of birth and rebirth.

Reinier Lagendijk

Joncquil

As a whole the show brings together three very different artists who use aspects of nature very distinctively and powerfully.

Reinier Lagendijk

Lagendijk’s sculptures bind Joncquil’s and Brand’s works very well together, displaying their suggestive expression.

Reinier Lagendijk

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all pictures courtesy to the artists and Galerie Ramakers, Den Haag

 

Bertus Pieters

Ossip; Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

Presently Ossip has an exhibition at Galerie Ramakers.

On a late winter afternoon i popped in at the gallery to have a look and make a few pictures.

Ossips works always remind me of nkisi objects from the Congo Basin.

These objects are usually statues or statuettes representing spirits which contain power and whose power can be influenced by nailing pieces of metal or wood into them.

In that way the course of life is meant to be influenced, usually in a more positive way.

It seems Ossip is doing something like that by re-personalising old photographs and reproductions.

One can only hope it will influence life to make it less painful,

or maybe Ossip’s works illustrate the pain of the absurd.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all pictures courtesy to Ossip and Galerie Ramakers

 

Bertus Pieters

Tomas Rajlich, Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

Quite some time ago i visited Galerie Ramakers to write a review for Villa La Repubblica about the exhibition of works by Tomas Rajlich. Click here to read the full review (in Dutch).

In the mean time there is a new exhibition at the gallery, but here are still some pictures with details of the Rajlich show.

Born in 1940 in Czechoslovakia, Rajlich lived for some forty years in The Hague. Now he is living and working in the Czech republic and in Italy.

Ramakers showed some of his works of the last few decades, while presently there is still an exhibition of Rajlich’s early works at the Gemeentemuseum here in The Hague.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

Content of the pictures courtesy to Tomas Rajlich and Galerie Ramakers.

 

Bertus Pieters