Gaye Black, Dolls and Bones; HOK Gallery, The Hague

Gaye Black (1956) was once the bass player Gaye Advert of punk band The Adverts (1976-1979).

As such she was a female hero of the punk movement, and, in fact, she still is as she makes art.

Her work is characteristically punk in its celebration of the bizarre, the cheeky, of freedom, humour and of life and death.

In quite a few works she uses symmetry as a way of composition, giving her the opportunity to multiply all kinds of weird details.

Generally, the presented works, currently on show at HOK Gallery, don’t seem to have a certain subject or theme.

They all give a glimpse in a punk universe.

However, the gallery has closed because of the covid-19 virus (maybe you can try and peer in through the gallery’s window).

After all, in a small space of some thirteen square yards it is difficult to keep a five feet distance from each other.

But, apart from that, punk goes on!

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to Gaye Black and HOK Gallery, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!

Fluid Desires; Nest, The Hague

Shanta Rao

Are our desires fluid?

Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Inge van Genuchten
Inge van Genuchten

Or are our ideas in general fluid?

Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard

Or is the character of the world more fluid than we would like or than we were once used to?

Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard

The exhibition Fluid Desires at Nest has been closed down early because of the Corona virus Covid-19.

Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard

When i visited the gallery last week the government was just giving a press conference about new measures and recommendations to contain the spread of the virus.

Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Mimosa Echard
Shanta Rao

The next day Nest, the museums and many other exhibition platforms closed their doors.

Shanta Rao
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat

In a way there is a link between the spread of the virus and its consequences, and the works shown in Fluid Desires.

Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat

As Nest says on its website: “…concepts that had been carved in stone for decades, have now started to flow. Notions like time, space, reality, nature, the object, human and the object-man relation.”

Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat

That quotation seems to suit the present more than ever.

Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat

Nest is always trying to give reflections on the present in its shows, but it couldn’t have imagined when planning this particular exhibition – and neither could curator Nanda Janssen – that the present would be as fluid as it is now at this very moment.

Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat
Maya Rochat

There is nothing predictive in the show – artists can’t predict the future any better than you or me – , it is just that the world itself has taken these works into the very fluid present and has given them a new value.

Shanta Rao
Hicham Berrada
Hicham Berrada
Hicham Berrada

On one hand it is regrettable that the show was closed down early, but on the other hand that seems to have become an action that is part of the show.

Hicham Berrada
Hicham Berrada
Hicham Berrada

In the mean time the show is very interesting and it is staged aesthetically as usual.

Hicham Berrada
Jérôme Robbe
Jérôme Robbe
Jérôme Robbe

That “as usual” has however been taken over by a radical and extremely fluid move of nature itself.

Leonid Tsvetkov
Leonid Tsvetkov
Leonid Tsvetkov

The aesthetics of beauty is no match for the radical aesthetics of life and death.

Leonid Tsvetkov
Jérôme Robbe
Jérôme Robbe
Jérôme Robbe

In the mean time some pictures of the show may give you some reason for reflection.

Jérôme Robbe
Marie Maillard
Marie Maillard

Reflection is our best tool for the present and for the future, especially during this kind of imposed Ramadan period.

Marie Maillard
Shanta Rao
Shanta Rao
Shanta Rao

So i decided to present some extra pictures of this, by now, invisible show.

Shanta Rao
Shanta Rao
Shanta Rao

If you are puzzled about the pictures i refer you to Nest’s website which gives you some extra information about the different artists.

Shanta Rao

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to all artists and Nest, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!

 

Remembrance; Galerie Helder, The Hague

David Engel

Galerie Helder has decided to close its doors for the time being because of the Covid-19 virus.

Bas Lobik

It won’t organise the planned finissage of its present exhibition Remembrance with works by David Engel (1973), René Korten (1957) and Bas Lobik (1965).

Bas Lobik
Bas Lobik

The trio of artists find themselves happily together in this show about both the freedom and the framework that materials offer.

Bas Lobik
David Engel

Engel’s objects are wall sculptures made of multiplex, but seemingly with none of the rigidity of the material.

David Engel
David Engel

By bending his material he has pushed it to its limits and has given it with paint and shadows a striking sense of lyricism.

René Korten
René Korten

Lobik’s works may remind you a bit of Morris Louis’ (1912-1962) later paintings.

René Korten
David Engel

They share the mystery of what paint does when given its freedom within the boundaries of gravity.

David Engel
Bas Lobik

However Lobik’s paintings, by their nuanced details, will force you to take a close look and maybe to find yourself lost in them.

Bas Lobik
David Engel

This sense of giving space to paint itself and to its properties, is also strongly present in Korten’s works.

David Engel
René Korten

He combines this free flowing capacity with elements of geometry in sometimes stark contrast, almost as a metaphor for the interaction of nature and culture.

René Korten
René Korten

As such it is a pity this exhibition, which may even invite to reflect on the present situation, will not be visible for those who planned to see it in its last days.

Bas Lobik
Bas Lobik

On the other hand it is interesting to see how exhibitions unexpectedly become statements of the human condition.

René Korten
René Korten

In the case of this exhibition it has become a statement of lyricism within the framework of material and natural properties.

René Korten

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to all artists and Galerie Helder, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!

 

 

Façades of The Hague #106

Villa, built in 1902, Nieuwe Parklaan.

Its style is quite distinctive for the period around 1900.

Like in the different eclectic neo-styles of the 19th century there is a strong sense of decoration, but it tries to be simpler, less opulent.

In that way it gives more space to refinement in the details, stressing the different volumes of the building.

As such, a villa like this stands stylistically just at the beginning of the huge modernist developments in the 20th century.

© Villa Next Door 2020

All pictures were taken in March 2017.

Bertus Pieters

Façades of The Hague from #72 onwards: https://villanextdoor2.wordpress.com/category/facades-of-the-hague/

Façades of The Hague #1 – 71: https://villanextdoor.wordpress.com/category/facades-of-the-hague/

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Vèf jaah! (Five years!); Dürst Britt & Mayhew, The Hague

Dürst Britt & Mayhew celebrates its five years anniversary with works by all its thirteen artists (and its designer). For this occasion some works were given on loan by buyers and collectors whom the gallery has succeeded in gathering over the past few years. I leave you here with some aspects of what is on show as i’ve already written extensively about it. Click here if you want to read more by yours truly about the show (in English).

Wieske Wester
David Roth
Sybren Renema
Sybren Renema
Alex Farrar
Raúl Ortega Ayala
Raúl Ortega Ayala
Alexandre Lavet
Willem Hussem
Willem Hussem
Joseph Montgomery
David Roth
Paul Beumer
Paul Beumer
Joseph Montgomery
Wieske Wester
Puck Verkade
Puck Verkade
Lennart Lahuis
Lennart Lahuis
Alexandre Lavet
Jacqueline de Jong
Jacqueline de Jong
Pieter Paul Pothoven, Chantal Hendriksen
Pieter Paul Pothoven
Alex Farrar

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to all artists and Dürst Britt & Mayhew, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!

Christie van der Haak and guests: Different than Usual; Galerie Maurits van de Laar, The Hague

Hélène Penninga

Well, there you are: i proposed to publish only a few pictures as a teaser for what i think you should really go and see.

Christie van der Haak
Christie van der Haak
Jos de l’Orme
Jos de l’Orme

But then, when selecting pictures for this post, i was overcome by the same kind of drunkenness you get when seeing this exhibition, and here are far more pictures than i wanted to publish intially.

Katia Borghesi
Katia Borghesi
Peter Vos, Ellen van Dijk

Source of this drunkenness is Christie van der Haak (1950), or rather her work.

Peter Vos
Peter Vos
Ellen van Dijk

She invited sixteen guest artists to show their works against the backdrop of her own wall decorations at Galerie Maurits van de Laar.

Ellen van Dijk
Marjolijn van der Meij
Marjolijn van der Meij
Hélène Penninga

At the opening one of the artists called it a dialogue, which i think is the right idea.

Christie van der Haak
Pim Piët
Pim Piët

But it is also a declaration of love for the works of these very different artists and even for art in general.

Diederik Gerlach
Christie van der Haak
Christie van der Haak

Most of them are no artists of the gallery, some of them are household names (at least in The Hague), some of them are quite unknown here behind the dunes, which makes the show all the more interesting.

Diederik Gerlach
Anya Belyat Giunta, Elise Hageman
Anya Belyat Giunta
Elise Hageman

Generally, Van der Haak’s decorations give an extra dimension to the works of the other artists.

David Pedraza
Theun Govers
Marcel Zalme, Reinoud van Vught, Harold de Bree

It stresses their peculiarity, or even their mystery, if you wish.

Marcel Zalme
Reinoud van Vught
Harold de Bree

It is as if everything takes place within one big frame story which leads you to all kinds of different narratives and temperaments, all glowing with their own characteristics.

Nynke Koster

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to all artists and Galerie Maurits van de Laar, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!

Werner Cuvelier, 1970 and Beyond; PARTS Project, The Hague

I visited PARTS Project to write a review for Villa La Repubblica about its present exhibition 1970 and Beyond with works by Werner Cuvelier (1939). Click here to read the review (in Dutch);

As i have written quite extensively about the show in Villa La Repubblica i leave you here just with some impressions.

Click here to read the review in Villa La Repubblica.

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to Werner Cuvelier and PARTS Prohect, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!

Façades of The Hague # 105

This façade in Oude Molstraat is part of a much bigger complex of monastic buildings, built and rebuilt in different ages.

The complex itself has been a place of refuge for Roman Catholics since the Protestant Reformation at the beginning of the Dutch Revolt (1568-1648).

The present façade was built around 1900. The building contains a small chapel.

© Villa Next Door 2020

All pictures were taken in March 2017.

Bertus Pieters

Façades of The Hague from #72 onwards: https://villanextdoor2.wordpress.com/category/facades-of-the-hague/

Façades of The Hague #1 – 71: https://villanextdoor.wordpress.com/category/facades-of-the-hague/

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!

What We Do Not (want to) See, Willy De Sauter – Gert Scheerlinck – D.D. Trans – Johan De Wit; Galerie Ramakers, The Hague

Johan De Wit

I visited Galerie Ramakers to write a review for Villa La Repubblica about its present exhibition What We Do Not (want to) See with works by Willy De Sauter (1938), Johan De Wit (1960) D.D. Trans (1963) and Gert Scheerlinck (1974). Click here to read the review (in Dutch).

Johan De Wit

As i have written quite extensively about the show in Villa La Repubblica i leave you here just with some impressions without words.

Johan De Wit
Johan De Wit
D.D. Trans
D.D. Trans
D.D. Trans
D.D. Trans
D.D. Trans
D.D. Trans
D.D. Trans
Gert Scheerlinck
Johan De Wit
Gert Scheerlinck
Gert Scheerlinck
D.D. Trans
Gert Scheerlinck
Gert Scheerlinck
Gert Scheerlinck
Gert Scheerlinck
Willy De Sauter

 

 

Willy De Sauter
Willy De Sauter
Gert Scheerlinck
Willy De Sauter
Johan De Wit
Willy De Sauter
Willy De Sauter

Click here to read the review in Villa La Repubblica.

Johan De Wit

© Villa Next Door 2020

Contents of all photographs courtesy to the artists and Galerie Ramakers, Den Haag.

Bertus Pieters

VILLA NEXT DOOR IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ADVERTISING ON THIS PAGE!!