As it happened, i entered GEM to see Maaike Schoorel’s (1973) show together with a couple.

The man walked around for a few seconds, came back to his lady and said it’s all empty spaces, there’s really nothing to be seen in these paintings.

The lady smiled at me understandingly and said well, somebody has to paint that too and they left the exhibition.

Maybe painting just wasn’t the couple’s cup of tea.

On the other hand it also shows what is going on in Schoorel’s paintings.

She makes abstractions of common themes like interiors, still lifes, portraits etc, usually based on photographs.

Her ways of abstraction are purely intuitive.

She minimalises the information, but not in a minimalist way.

Whether you recognise the picture or not isn’t really important.

In a way they all look like moments of just awakening, the moment you start looking, but still not realising what you really see.

Or they are like loud music heard from far.

When making pictures of these paintings i realised that photographs won’t give you any idea of them.

That is my regular conclusion, but with Schoorel’s work this is all the more true.

I am a great admirer of these works, but Schoorel’s way of painting may also become a kind of mannerism.

[Click on the pictures to enlarge]

© Villa Next Door 2017

Content of all pictures courtesy to Maaike Schoorel and GEM, Den Haag

 

Bertus Pieters