My paintings are based on walks in the Centre of Italy. Not the concrete description, but the experience of hiking and an encounter with a concrete place determine my work. I am trying to give my walks a place within the borders of a painting, as a metaphor for myself getting lost. I recall a statement by Albertus Magnus: " the place is the active principle that is capable to give birth to forms." (from: Natura Loci, 1250) I am a firm believer in the creative power of a place, the magic of a place that can give birth to shapes, a place like a womb.
The Latin translation of the word uterus means MATRIX. The uterus as a place where a concept can materialize in a body, an object. Matrix also means the origin, the archetype of a stem from which all twigs are formed.
The matrix as a metaphor for thought, something formless that becomes form in a painting. The formless fluidity of oil and water that crystallizes in a picture, such as the uncontrolled fluent magma that crystallizes in marble. It is painted, layer upon layer. The paint is applied, scraped off again, and rebuilt, ... like the surface of the earth is formed.
The painting as a description of something that continuously changes, from the formless to form, from form to the formless.
Patrick Verlaak

opening foreword on Friday, April 21 by Jeroen Laureyns

mpefm BELGIUM art press release