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Ton van Os (1941)

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During the last years of the twentieth century, Ton van Os created, among other things, series of works dedicated to the painter Paolo Uccello and the composer Johann Sebastian Bach.

In the last 20 years, his source of inspiration is both the music and the writings about music and visual arts of American composer Morton Feldman. Since 2000, he made more than 150 mostly large paintings black-and-white, in bright colors, in glittering silver and in sparkling gold. Paintings of space and sourceless, invented light with shifting structures and patterns in which, as the Dutch composer Anthony Fiumara wrote in his review MorTon: ‘Paradoxical themes are discussed as dynamic stasis, chaotic order, unpredictable repetition, intuitive austerity and ringing silence.’

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This is how the text on Ton van Os his site gives a description of his works and career. This is an artist who’s works are timeless, Even his earliest works from the early Seventies ( Forty Etchings book is available at http://www.ftn-books.com ) has this same abstract quality. Of course the scenes are realistic and depicts his suroundings or details from it, but this can only be seen when studying more intensely the (abstract) compositions. From a distance it is pure geometric abstraction. When you consider this the beginning of his career you can follow his artistic career with more and more abstraction over the decades…. eventually resulting in the repetition of forms in a rythm which is music inspired. http://www.ftn-books has several Ton van Os titles available.

ton van os set

 

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Dolf Henkes (1903-1989)

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Without knowing i have collected a number of important Dolf Henkes titles and what struck me is that the interest in his works is something which is still here and constant over the past six decades . Henkes was an artist creating on the crossroads of realism and abstraction and this shows in his paintings.

Born and raised in Rotterdam, moving to Paris and staying at Curacao for a while all these places shaped the art Dolf Henkes was creating. His painting touch is vivid and light and the city of Rotterdam valued the art of Henkes and presented him with a beautiful retrospective exhibition in 1988 to memorate his 85th birthday. Shortly after he died, but his name is still very much alive and used for the Henkes art price , which is each year presented to a young aspiring artist from Rotterdam. The Museum Boymans van Beuningen ( now closed for renovation) has a large collection of important Dolf Henkes paintings. http://www.ftn-books.com has some nice Dolf Henkes publications available.

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MIGUEL YBÁÑEZ (1946)

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Born in Spain, but living and working for practically his entire artistic life in the Netherlands, he has managed to build a strong following of avid collectors, culminating in a Museum presentation at the Museum van der Togt.

Intense colours and bold gestures articulate Ybáñez’ paintings. Although largely communicating through abstraction, Ybáñez sometimes hints at the figurative world. However, these figurative elements have become distorted by interlacement of planes and extensive re-working of painted layers, creating complex structures and depth. The play of dimensionality is reminiscent of early Cubist painting. The Cubists, were inspired by elements of the visible world that they reduced form 3-D to 2-D, in contrast, Ybáñez creates a new dimensionality. The artist prefers innovation over conformity, therefore, to him, the tangible world has its limitations and a new visual language emerges.

Ybáñez is an intellectual with a sardonic sense of humour. Through his titles the artist enjoys creating seemingly bizarre connections. In fact, Ybáñez’s work belongs to the realm of philosophy and metaphysics, a world that defies traditional logic.

Ybáñez works in the tradition of Arte Povera and embraces a range of techniques to create works of varying scale and form. His reliefs, sculptures and assemblages are made of cloth, cardboard, metal, plaster and found objects. The resulting works are unified by an overall off-white finish which imbues the forms with a timeless and ethereal presence. In his work Ybáñez strives to negate the boundaries between past and present, ‘high’ and ‘low’ art.

The artist won numerous awards including the Premio de Dibujo, Galiana, Spain, 1979 and the Premio de Pintura Congreso de los Diputados, Madrid, Spain, 1985

www.ftn-books.com has several Ybanez titles available