5 minute read
Stephane Vereecken of Belgium creates highly original surrealist art
STEPHANE VEREECKEN BRUXELLES, BELGIUM
SURREALIST, DIGITAL
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Whilst Stephane uses a lot of photographic layers in his artworks, his process is far closer to that of a painter, mixing photographic elements and often adding in hand drawings to tell - as he puts it - ‘The story of an unfinished life’
Rabid animals - 018 30CM X 42CM Digital Print on Paper
Successful artists often experiment to find a unique style, and Stephane seems to be finding original standpoints repeatedly. The recent ‘Hotel Mutation’ and ‘Rabid Animals’ series are distinct, yet grounded in a similar idea - He explains ‘...the bodies are projections of the human, and the objects are sculptures, a container. A universe of reality and also of surrealism, as a reflection of our world.’
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He became an artist whilst still at school, often missing his classes to do art instead. He states ‘I was not born in a family where art was well accepted, they are not very cultivated and so to them I seem like an alien’. When I started to miss all my studies and most of my art teachers started to hate me, then I felt like I was becoming an artist.
White Wall 008 42CM X 30CMDigital Print on Paper
I had a multidisciplinary artistic education, I studied different styles and artistic materials. I was interested in drawings and fashion, advertising and then painting. When I was twenty I was an abstract and surrealist painter, until 30, when I chose photography as a definitive artistic practice in my art.
Rabid animals 008 42CM X 30CM Digital Print on Paper
Hotel Mutation 003 40CM X 40CMDigital Print on Paper
(detail) Hotel Mutation 003 40CM X 40CMDigital Print on Paper
Hotel Mutation 004 40CM X 40CM Digital Print on Paper
Hotel Mutation 004 40CM X 40CM (detail) Digital Print on Paper
I tell a story or several unfinished stories in a single image, with drawings overprinting photographs and I begin to deconstruct the image and the story. I split the messages between a drawing and a photographed structure. Abstract pieces have begun to appear in my new works, and I can’t wait to see what it will look like in a few months.’
Shown on this and the next page, we’ve picked our some of the fine detail within the Hotel Mutation series artworks.
Stephanes’ style evolved from his polaroids of nature, animals and abstract forms later adding drawing and paintings on the little Polaroids. He has moved into large paper formats, with photographic collages and writings on images. Even video entered his artistic practice for several years.
With regard to inspiration, Stephane mentions dreams and the world around him, meeting people and the desire to affect a structural and sociological change. When he wakes in the morning, he feels the need to recreate his dreams, and so he describes his work as automatic, between dream and reality.
An avid art lover himself, he says he discovers fabulous artists every day, and lists Jêrome Bosch and the Flemish painters as a universal source of inspiration.
He’s believes that the new “Hyperrealistic” art will be an essential part of our future, saying ‘A single, concise image can show (our) new everyday technologies and critically, in a mirror-like fashion, show us who we are.’
Hotel Mutation 005 40CM X 40CM
Hotel Mutation 005 40CM X 40CM (detail)
Hotel Mutation 008 40CM X 40CM Digital Print on Paper
Hotel Mutation 008 40CM X 40CM Digital Print on Paper (detail)
On being an artist, Stephane says ‘An artist is a free spirit that many people around the world would like to silence because he doesn’t have a formatted mind - he questions and contemplates the world - We are in a complicated time for freedom of expression ... For me, an artist must not be an activist, he must question and create forms and new waves - People need to dream. He is a dreamer.
The artist has successfully exhibited in art galleries in Brussels and Belgium and has been published in multiple magazines in Europe and the USA - a full list can be seen on his bio below.
He is offering 6 of 12 of every limited edition exclusively through Artfuly.
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Hotel Mutation 009 40CM X 40CM Digital Print on Paper
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