Winand Staring Explores Abstraction in the Elements – By David Ulrichs

While the choice of Spa, Belgium is a perfect fit for the work of the Venezuelan-born Dutch artist Winand Staring, putting contemporary art on view in a Centre Bien-être is by no means ‘the done thing’ — at least not yet.

Winand Staring Explores Abstraction in the Elements

By David Ulrichs

 

 

 

 

 

While the choice of Spa, Belgium is a perfect fit for the work of the Venezuelan-born Dutch artist Winand Staring, putting contemporary art on view in a Centre Bien-être is by no means ‘the done thing’ — at least not yet. Nevertheless, in a show titled, "Abstraction in the Elements – On a Water Note," Staring brings alluring visualization to his respect for the first natural element and its potential to change the universe.

Staring’s twelve pieces dawn titles such as Seascape Antarctica, Water Crystal, Seascape Blue, Seascape Green, Water Wish, Sea Wish, Water Blood for Life and stand in dynamic dialogue with water. This is true in a twofold way: not only does water comprise the subject matter of the acrylic and oil abstractions, but it also fills the viewing space conceptually, as the exhibition is set near Thermes de Spa.

Seascape Antarctica is hung in a space filled with copious amounts of light, which enlivens the canvas. Bathed in an expansive soft blue, the work is not merely representational; rather, the artist’s personal feelings about the seascape are transposed onto the canvas, using the medium of paint. Here, a subtle horizon weaves its way into the background of the composition to create a fathomless depth, invoking the depth of the sea.

An accompanying painting of the same title and tonal values echos the work in an expanded size. There is an added accentuation of difference realized in the primed strips of canvas that are layered upon the painting’s surface. The viewer is immediately reminded of Barnett Newman’s Ornament I and Ornament II works from 1948, as he originated the technique of covering strips of canvas in masking tape and integrating them in the texture of the composition. These white geometrical stripes already had a feigned presence in the larger version of Seascape Antarctica, but here, due to the size of the canvas, they are much more poignantly visible. In this work the horizon creates a doubling effect — as if the viewer is faced with two film frames, vertically stacked one above the other.

Another seascape piece, Water Blood for Life, meditates on the symmetry of water. Four red elements are visible in each of the corners of the canvas. These elements accent the important action taking place in the centre, where colour graduation is clearly visible in the expressive strokes that give movement to the piece. A similar kinetic dimension can also be seen in Water Crystal, which functions as a visual dialectic centralizing the project of the Seascape paintings. Water Crystal is a work in slightly larger scale and invokes the movement of melting and deformation. Devoid of large expressive brush strokes, a strong, flat black effectively foregrounds a suspended expanse of water, giving the work great tension, as it omits the sense of traditional time.

Seascape Blue and Seascape Green, take their colours from nature and present us with other abstracted impressions of nature’s most basic element. In contrast, L’Embarras du Choix and Apr�s le Choix, L’Embarras confront us with light beige-brown coloured backgrounds flecked with earthly coloured geometrical shapes. These works introduce the meeting of earth and water figuratively. Then, in, Trumpet Fish, Staring engages with earth as material, invoking the materiality of Rauschenberg into his vocabulary of expression. The relief of this rhomboid-cut canvas maintains the colour and texture of earth, mixing it with the colours and textures of water to evoke a touching vision of our planet.