Ilse D'Hollander

Background

D'Hollander waa born in Sint-Niklaas, Belgium, on May 18, 1968.

Education

Ilse D'Hollander attended St. Carolus, Sint-Niklaas, between 1981 and 1986, and Kunsthumaniora RISCO Berchem since 1987. In the year 1988, she studied at the Higher Institute for Fine Arts in Antwerp (now Royal Academy of Fine Arts) and during 1989-1991 at the St. Lucas Higher Institute for Visual Arts in Ghent (later known as LUCA School of Arts).

Career

D'Hollander decided to fully devote herself to painting at the end of the 1980s. This was not so obvious a choice in a period when other media started to replace painting in the public arena. During that time painting was several times declared as dead.

Under the great influence of such masters as Paul Cézanne and Nicholas de Staël, Ilse D’Hollander’s starting point in painting was the observation of reality. Her contact with Raoul de Keyzer also left clear signs on her artworks. The paintings and drawings produced by D’Hollander between 1989 and 1997 can be viewed as an investigation into the medium of painting. For her the approach to painting stood pivotal.

Ilse D’Hollander was totally committed to painting as an intellectual and emotional endeavour. Her small-scale canvases and works on paper were charged with references to the everyday life. D’Hollander’s paintings are not always immediately recognizable as straightforward landscapes.

The last two years of her life were particularly productive. However, only one solo exhibition of her work was held during her lifetime. It was organized at In Den Bouw, Kalken, in 1996. Her works were also included in such group exhibitions as Aula Art, Ghent (1996) and Urmel Gallery, Gent (1994). Ilse D’Hollander committed suicide in 1997, when she was 28.

Achievements

• Though Ilse D’Hollander lived a short live, she managed to leave a mark in the world history of art. Over the past decade her works have been the subject of a number of solo and group exhibits in Europe and the United States, where her art has found a receptive new audience.
  
  Posthumous solo exhibitions have been held at Lucas De Bruycker Gallery, Ghent (2004), Geukens & De Vil, Antwerp (2010), M Museum, Leuven (2013), Konrad Fischer Galerie, Berlin (2014), Sean Kelly Gallery, New York (2016), White House Gallery, Leuven (2017), etc.

Works

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  • At the End of the Way

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Views

Quotations: "A painting is created out of a confluence of thoughts and the act of painting itself."

"A painting comes into being when ideas and the act of painting coincide. When referring to ideas, it implies that as a painter, I am not facing my canvas as a neutral being but as an acting being who is investing into the act of painting. My being is present in my action on the canvas."

"It is painting itself that always remains fundamental; with due regard for the person who is painting. The viewer who turns his gaze on my paintings remains even more fundamental."

Personality

Quotes from others about the person

• David Nash about her work: "Floating color fields in soft earthy shades evoke feelings of calm and tranquility; abstract, and free from much literal representation of the world around us."

References

• Works on Paper: Ilse D Hollander More than 17 years after her death, Ilse D'Hollander's oeuvre is still internationally appreciated and frequently exhibited. This book shows her enormous concentration and condensed power. Text in English, German, and Dutch.
  2014
• Ilse D'Hollander The paintings of Ilse D'Hollander (Sint-Niklaas, 1968-1997) result from a personal search for the medium of painting. Via meticulous observation of her immediate environment, D'Hollander created compositions of colored surfaces and lines, vibrating forms and transparent overpainting. This publication coincides with the exhibition Ilse D'Hollander M - Museum Leuven, from June 27 to October 20, 2013.
  2014