HENK VAN VESSEM

Abstract Expressionism

Henk van Vessem is an artist who paints with a grand gesture in strongly contrasting colours, at least as far as the canvases are concerned. The pastels are of a more friendly nature and show softer colours. In the drawings, the representations become almost transparent and the emotional values of color make way for the spiritual values of transparent colours.

The images on the canvases are sculpted with paint and palette knife into expressionistic landscapes, in which no fields or roads can be seen, but the signs of reflections of a mental nature. The artist does not shy away from the reversal of the question and answer game, as is apparent from the title of a painting: "The water asks about time".

The painting "The horizon has become water" does not have the atmosphere of a watered-down plain, but rather has the opposite quality of a large expanse of sand shimmering with heat. The desire for water distorts perception and creates a mirage.

Time, space and matter become exponents of inner imagination in the art of Henk van Vessem. The sighting takes place "under the foliage of your hair", as evidenced by the title of a canvas. Contrary to what this title suggests, the artist's thoughts are clearly formulated and expressed in brilliant colors in his paintings.

Above our heads is a sun of fiery thoughts." A sentence could not sound more eloquent and the canvas that bears this title shows fire as a source of new orders and possibilities in a world of familiar interpretations.

Color and form manage, with mutual cohesion, to interpret a world of meanings that is without borders, or in other words, less limited than the spoken language to speak "for itself".