The "inner journeys" of Belgian Rinus Van de Velde
Until 15 May, as part of Europalia, the Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels is offering a journey into the parallel universe of Rinus Van de Velde, where imagination and reality merge through various media.
Initially a sculptor, the visual artist, born in Leuven in 1983 but now based in Antwerp, has been drawing for many years, first in colour and then in black and white. No one was more surprised than he was to be invited to the "TRAINS & TRACKS" Festival, as he admits he hates travelling. If his exhibition opens with a life-size train, it is because for him, the train is a symbol of travel, not physical but inner or imaginary. And dreamt up meetings with dead or living artists, such as Claude Monet, Pierre Bonnard, Henri Rousseau, Laure Prouvost, Fischli & Weiss, Joan Mitchell, and Edvard Munch, whom he admires. Rinus' used his speciality as his common thread: the mental journey. So he remembers that during a trip to the USA at the age of 14, he reached the edge of the Grand Canyon but stayed in the car; he would discover it later in the works of David Hockney, because he was convinced that it would be more beautiful in his paintings than in reality. For this artist, it is more important to dream life than to live it.
A multi-faceted exhibition awaits visitors, since it presents works in pastel, ceramics, installations, photographs and films.