Philippe Van Snick

1988

Installation, variable dimensions.
Materials: plaster board, wood cubes

Collection: Collection M HKA, Antwerp (Inv. no. BK006022).

Philippe Van Snick’s work is characterised by its pared-down form, closely related to Minimalism and the repeated use of the same colours. This installation consists of two wooden cubes and 120 plaster boards. One of the cubes is painted black, the other light blue. With these colours Van Snick is referencing the contrast between night and day, a theme that forms a significant constant in his oeuvre. On each cube ten plaster boards are resting. The number ten is also a recurrent feature in Van Snicks’s work, as seen, for instance, in his ten standard colours. The other plaster boards are arranged to form a construction reminiscent of a domino game or a labyrinth. These plaster boards create a rhythmical, dynamic but somewhat chaotic whole, in contrast to the heavy, clumsy and regulated cubes. In his works Van Snick wants to demonstrate the anarchy that is everywhere, but also the possibilities to organise it. The bipolar, here expressed in the opposition between darkness and light, is an important feature in his whole oeuvre. The simplified visual language is also typical of him, although he never fully enters into the mainstream of Minimalism but allows for the unpredictability of his viewers’ response, which also gives his work a meaningful openness and vulnerability.