"I am a fan of Guillaume Bijl's work.
Whenever I see an installation by Guillaume Bijl, I feel the urge to add a painting of my own to that installation. When I asked Guillaume a year ago if he would be interested in such a collaboration, he didn't ask any questions but indicated that he wanted to participate in the project. That made me happy, but at the same time I broke out in a cold sweat. How was I going to explain this to people? You can't just hang a painting in an installation by another artist, can you?
As far as I'm concerned, there are no rules for art: ANYTHING GOES! But the art world demands an explanation, a statement. I don't have that, at least not yet. Everything I ever did as an artist, I did intuitively, without intellectual reason. I just did what I felt I had to do. Theoretical explanations and profound thoughts always came years later. That will be no different with this project…"
- Philip Akkerman, 29 September, 2024
About Guillaume Bijl
Guillaume Bijl (1946, lives and works in Antwerp) has been known since the 1970s for his large-scale installations for which he uses found objects. With this, Bijl took a pioneering role in the reintroduction of the ready-made. He shows the viewer various aspects of our Western 'civilisation' and consumer society. He creates an 'archaeology of our time' using stereotypes in a tragicomic, alienating way. Guillaume is represented in the Netherlands by Lumen Travo Gallery.
About Philip Akkerman
Philip Akkerman (1957, lives and works in The Hague) has painted exclusively self-portraits since 1981. Thanks to his self-imposed restriction to self-portraits, he no longer has to worry about the subject. This gives him the freedom to experiment wildly with styles, colours and shapes. Philip uses the wealth of painting techniques and movements from the entire history of art and the resulting oil paintings vary from realistic to abstract, from detailed to deliberately naive.
This exhibition presents a selection of recent paintings by Philip Akkerman, combined with a number of installations by Guillaume Bijl.
