redunzl_art

redunzl_art Biography

Belgium, born 1968

From a very early age I was interested in expression and art. Visiting exhibitions, doing school theatre, art academy, playing music, literature, film, comics... from low brow to high brow culture, I enjoyed it all. At eighteen I was equally fascinated by Bartok and Rubens as by David Bowie, Salvador Dali, John Buscema, Roman Polanski, Zappa, Bergman and many others. Drawing was my first love. As a child and teenager I could sit and draw comic book characters for hours at an end. I learned the basics of figurative work at the art academy of Kortrijk. After that I became an autodidact. I paint mostly with oils and acrylics. I prefer panels to canvas though I use both. My subject matter often deals with childhood memories that left an indelible impression (B-movies, comic books, pop-culture), with my love for Dada, Surrealism, Expressionism and all things absurd. The fantastical and the macabre is often present. Lately themes emerge that critique society or portray social aspects.
For me, the absurdity of Dadaism is the perfect description of this world and humanity: seemingly illogical, sarcastic, ever-changing, irreverent, erotic, cruel, naive, terrifying and anti-everything. In the words of the great comedian Groucho Marx: “Whatever it is, I'm against it.” In Surrealism I find the absurdity of Dada in more spiritual and psychological dimensions. The unconscious and its dream logic, impossible worlds and surprising associations. To me, this is how thought and the material world really works. Never linear but colliding in all directions, labyrinthine, shrouded in many layers of meaning and nonsense. The influence of German Expressionism on my work is in the emotional component which can be raw and uncompromising.
A lot of my work can be considered 'dark' though I do not think of myself as a horror artist. The darkness in my art has more of a a psychological background. There are recurring themes like isolation, despair, domination, abuse next to more free associative or symbolic surreal images. I draw from whatever touches me emotionally or aesthetically in life.