Klaas Kloosterboer | But came the waves

We are delighted to present a solo exhibition by Klaas Kloosterboer featuring a painting installation evocative of a sense of vanishing, ephemerality, and release. In Kloosterboer’s new paintings, he methodically prepares the conditions for the gouache to express itself on the circumstances of the canvas. In doing so, there is an exchange between the artist’s plan and the material’s own agency. The paintings can be seen as disappearing expressions, whereby monochromatic landscapes are fading away, slowly dissipating into the pallor of the canvas. Carefully dripping the paint onto the canvas, Kloosterboer allows for the material to find its way, to concentrate or evanesce. Zigzagging through the gallery space, a milky, translucent fabric guides the movement of the visitor whilst creating a misty atmosphere. 

For Kloosterboer, doubt is a principle. His work eludes proclamation and welcomes indeterminacy, which is a productive category. Doubting is not a consequence of uneasiness, but a humble openness to grasp the world primordially. However, once realised, the work does not strike as uncertain: we feel sense of completeness in which artistic intention and material response come together. 

The human body is alluded in the exhibition by means of fabric sleeves and gloves, which are recurring elements in Kloosterboer’s sculptural works. Their transient and delicate appearance is met with a degree of irregularity in their shape and size. They are not direct representations of clothing, but rather the kind of imperfect invocations in dreams. They find their subtlety in the contemplative and soothing atmosphere in the space. 

Presented in the gallery backroom there is a series of former work on paper with written text in black and white. They constitute a more playful and methodical line of work in Kloosterboer’s practice, as they form a system of words and symbols that make up a personal artistic alphabet with which the visitor engages in a game of association and deduction. 

In But came the waves we are reminded again by Klaas Kloosterboer’s constant artistic inquiry, which keeps on bringing his work to new propositions fuelled by the joyful anticipation to what can still be done.

Klaas Kloosterboer lives and works in Schermerhorn, North Holland. Recent solo exhibitions include Kristof de Clercq Gallery; Galeria Structura, Sofia; Galerie Zink Waldkirchen, Waldkirchen; MNAC, Bucharest; Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo; Hidde van Seggelen, Hamburg; Kasteel Wijlre, Wijlre. His work has been part of recent group exhibitions in Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar; Billytown, The Hague; Galerie van Gelder, Amsterdam; Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam; and Dordrechts Museum, Dordrecht. His work has been collected in institutions such as Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Centraal Museum Utrecht, Dordrechts Museum, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Museum Voorlinden, Fries Museum, Museum Beelden aan Zee, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Textielmuseum Tilburg, and Kröller-Müller Museum.