NYAB Event - Christophe Coppens “Early Paintings”

Christophe Coppens “Early Paintings”

hpgrp gallery

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hpgrp GALLERY NEW YORK presents a first solo exhibition by L.A. based artist, Christophe Coppens.

A violent break with the past. A big bang. A new beginning.

Early Paintings is Christophe Coppens’ third art show since he left a 21-year-career as a fashion designer in Belgium to focus full-time on his art.

Mr. Coppens’ first art show after his departure from Belgium, Landscape 1, was commissioned by collector Mr Han Nefkens. It took place in May 2013 at the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum in Rotterdam, where the work now remains as part of the museum’s permanent collection. The artist rendered materials from his past life – office files, suits, and furniture, combined with ceramics – into new forms.

Moving on to use new materials, his second show, Landscape 2, took place in November 2013 in Tokyo and is now traveling in Japan.

Early Paintings is Coppens’ first solo show in New York and presents his first paintings – hence the show’s name.

“Landscape 1 was about deconstruction and archiving the past,” says Coppens, “Landscape 2 about toying around with my new life whilst still dealing with the previous one. These two landscapes were transition shows.
This next show is about healing the scars and re-building a new self, cell by cell.”

“I’ve been always afraid of painting. I have too much respect for the real painters, I guess. For the craft of painting. For my favorite painters.

But while I was making my last landscape for the Tokyo show I found myself sewing these small medallions in linen encrusted in the surface of the mountains. They worked as small canvases so I made simple drawings and paintings on them. That was my first step.”

“After returning from Tokyo I suddenly felt the urge to sew another medallion, but this time on a blank canvas. Now the canvas was broken, it was no longer holy. And I was no longer scared and felt that I could do whatever I wanted.
I still don’t see myself as a painter, but I used paint as a medium for this show, it had to be paint.“

“There is something very ritualised about starting each painting with sewing.
Sewing as some kind of healing, sewing my way through guilt. Mending my way to redemption. I had the urge to start from something very simple and basic, the oval and the circle, and then take it from there, build it up. And then paint over it, remove the paint again, paint over it, scrub it off again, over and over and over. Until I feel ready to let go and put the work to rest.”

“I don’t know if these paintings could be healing for anyone, but they sure have been to me. And I guess that’s the energy that is now trapped in them.”