Doing It My Way

Overview

Showcasing Belgium's vibrant and diverse art scene, this survey presents both young contemporary and leading artists in a representative cross-section spanning successive generations. The investigation features the work of 16 contemporary Belgian artists and encompasses painting, sculpture, and video. Juxtaposing groundbreaking and established, internationally acclaimed works with those of rising, contemporary young artists who have yet to be discovered, the study avoids adhering to a prescribed complex of themes, instead highlighting the characteristic motifs and associations running like a common thread through the artists’ works: emptiness and absence, a bleak environment, dark and mysterious spaces, and the blurring of boundaries between the absurd and the real. This bilingual edition includes English and German.

Author Biography

Walter Smerling is the chairman of the Foundation for Art and Culture in Bonn, the director of the Center for Modern and Contemporary Art in Duisburg, and the artistic director of Foundation Salzburg. He is the author of 60 Jahre – 60 Werke: Kunst aus der Bundesrepublik Deutschland von 1949 bis 2009; Art and Press: Kunst, Wahrheit, Wirklichkeit; Bernar Venet: Order and Chance; and Public Art Ruhr: Die Metropole Ruhr und die Kunst im öffentlichen Raum; and the editor of Anthony Cragg: Things on the Mind/Dinge im Kopf.