My local academy Sint-Niklaas (Belgium) is having its ‘open doors day’ this weekend. People can freely visit all the class rooms and get to know the various disciplines and look at the created art by the students.
A selection of my ‘Mars 2 Infinity’ art works are on display as well. You can find them in the class room and in the hallway.
Feel free to drop by and explore the academy.
More info at the academy website (dutch).
The academy group exposition ‘Model X’ came to an end last sunday. It was a great success with over 1000 visitors during these 3 weeks and an overall very positive reaction.
Over 30 students of the ateliers ‘Living Model 2D & 3D’ exhibited together a great variety of their works. The response of the visitors was very positive and praised the variety and quality of the showed works.
I showed recent artworks from my art series ‘M2I Traditional’ and ‘M2I Transhumanism’.
Thank you to everyone who came along. Your visit & positive reactions are very encouraging to continue our artistic journey.
And also thanks to the academy, my fellow students and especially to our art teacher Benny Luyckx, who made this all possible.
It was a great experience and we learned alot. Looking forward to a next one.
You can find more info about my participating artworks on the dedicated exposition page.
Kind Regards,
Steven
I am excited to announce I will participate in a new academy group exposition ‘Model X’.
The students of the ateliers ‘Living Model 2D & 3D’ will exhibit together a selection of their works.
I will be showing recent artworks from my art series ‘M2I Traditional’ and ‘M2I Transhumanism’.
The exposition will take place on location in the heart of Sint-Niklaas, Stationsstraat 43, in an empty building that is being taken decorated by the students and teachers.
vernissage on Friday 21 April at 7 pm.
from Saturday April 22 to Sunday May 7
Saturday, Sunday from 11am-5pm
More info at the academy page (nl).
Everyone welcome !
Kind Regards,
Steven
The year at the academy is progressing and the collection of new ‘March 2 Infinity’ art is taking shape.
The ‘March 2 Infinity’ art series depicts our world in a future far away. Those who could afford it, enhanced their bodies & minds and fled to the stars eons ago. The offspring of the poor souls left behind are since then scavenging the desolated earth in search of long forgotten technology in an attempt to become gods themselves and join their destiny between the stars.
The old prophecies talk about huge black stones within the landscape that should contain the secrets for a life in the clouds and beyond. Holy stories told for centuries already by the spirits healers & priests of these new religions.
Groups of damaged and broken bodies are since then forever scavenging the lands, in search of hope, between the desolated and ruined remains of what was once human society.
The ‘story’ is still being developed and I am seeing much potential for further story telling.
From a materials point of view I am trying to use a mixture of charcoal drawings and often thin downed oil painting on gessoed board & thick paper. Technique wise I am searching for an expressive tone while still maintaining readability. I experiment on smaller boards but also bigger sized canvas.
I am looking forward to further investigate this artistic path.
Kind Regards,
Steven
The new school year 2022 - 2023 at my local academy in ‘Sint-Niklaas’ has started again.
This will be my 9th year already. Time sure does fly.
I am going to focus again on expanding my ‘March 2 Infinity’ art series and universe.
Including new landscapes of our desolate world, torned away figures in search of their hope in the skies and beyond and portraits of transhumanists in search of the eternal life.
The first weeks brought already inspiration, various sketches and some new works …
Looking forward to yet another creative year.
Steven
1st of september … Back to school !
The new school year 2022 - 2023 at my local academy in ‘Sint-Niklaas’ has started again.
This will be my 9th year (model) drawing already. Time sure does fly.
As always it is a pleasure to see back the teacher, models and fellow students. After 2 months of ‘holidays’ it always feels a bit like ‘home coming’ when we enter the class room again.
The first lessons I typically practise model sketching to get myself back into the habbit of drawing. In the meanwhile I am slowly preparing and thinking about the directions I want to take with my running art series ‘Digital Waves’, ‘Desperate Poses’ and ‘March 2 Infinity’.
Looking forward to yet another creative year.
Steven
Yet another school year has passed at my local art academy in Sint-Niklaas (Belgium).
This year I have been focusing mostly on working on my ‘March 2 Infinities - Landscapes’ art series and I began to explore the new ‘Transhumanists’ art series.
Art is created using either traditional media like charcoal / oil paintings or using purely digital means. Combinations of both occur as well. Computer AI is used sometimes to generate new reference materials based upon existing own works.
It are definitely exciting times as an artist to explore and find new creative paths.
“The March to Infinity had departed. Will Humanity make the right choices?”
Within this art series I explore the impact of technology on the future of mankind - which has made itself nearly gods by applying extensions onto their own bodies & souls.
Earth however is rampaged by centuries of exploitation and technology misusages. The lucky (wealthy) ones fled to the stars and left this barren world ages ago. The unfortunates, who were left behind, are roaming the lands in search of huge black stones which should contain the information to reach the skies and the technologies to upgrade their wrecked bodies. Or at least that’s what the prophecies claim.
Eons have since then passed …
Wrecked bodies scavenging the lands in search for that forgotten knowledge. Hopeful they are longing for the eternal life among their brothers & sisters at the stars.
Barren landscapes are depicted using traditional oil painting inter mangled with AI driven reference generation based upon my own (traditional) works.
A new traditional work is created upon an AI generated reference on heavy gessoed paper or canvas using oil paints. The new work can then be served again to the AI for a new reference generation. And thus an unendless feedback loop is created and continued …
I created the term (abbreviation) ‘TRADQAN’ to indicate this kind of work progress.
I created several new works within this series and I am planning to continue to explore even more.
You can discover the art series at my Contemporary website. Various works are already available as NFT on OBJKT marketplace which runs on the CleanNFT blockchain Tezos .
’Transhumanism’ is a philosophical and intellectual movement which advocates the enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available sophisticated technologies that can greatly enhance longevity and cognition. (WIKI)
Technology (mis)used to modify one owns human body to reach the status of gods.
But does unchecked, wild & dangerous changes to one self modifies ones soul as well?
Nobody knows.
Results often madly gone wrong. Only a happy few that reach the goal of eternity.
This new art series depicts portraits of modified humans using a raw painting technique of oils mixed with charcoal on heavy gessoed paper.
I am planning on creating an extensive range of portraits. I might consider launching these series as a new NFT collection.
I am quite happy with my progress and new creative paths. I am definitely looking forward to a new year to continue exploring these art series.
Steven
My local academy Sint-Niklaas (Belgium) is having its ‘open doors day’ this weekend. People can freely visit all the class rooms and get to know the various disciplines and look at the created art by the students.
My traditional AI based art works are on display as well. You can find them in the class room and in the hallway.
Feel free to drop by and explore the academy.
More info at the academy website (dutch).
I am participating in the exposition ‘PARADE’ at the art academy in my home town Sint-Niklaas (Belgium).
I am displaying some of my new “tradqan” oil paintings from my ‘March 2 Infinity’ art series. The art series examines the impact of technology on humankind and the quest for Transhumanism. The works themselves are created using a process of feeding my own traditional oil paintings into an AI computer model which then generates new images. Those new images are then used as a source for creating a new traditional oil painting. And then the process restarts …
Students will also work in the exposition area during normal class hours so feel free to drop by and say hello.
More info regarding the exposition at the academy website (dutch).
The academy started the ‘Academy on Air’ initiative to stimulate art students to continue to work from home on there art works and to show pictures of there working spot via the social media.
As the school is still closed due to the corona virus outbreak this should help in motivating the students and to continue the school year.
The academy created a nice banner and the idea is to take a picture that includes the banner in your working spot, together with your new work, yourself at work, anything really …
The academy then regularly shows the pictures within their social media.
I took a picture of my atelier showing in the mirror a new drawing I have been working on.
So far I have been able to create a number of new drawings based upon my digital waves art series.
During Whats App video sessions I then discuss my progress with my teacher Benny. It is obviously not the same as the real life contact & advice but nevertheless it works and it is a great help.
Last weekend of the 25/26th of January there was the 2 yearly event ‘Night of the academy’ which features a non-stop flow of events at the art & music academy in my home town Sint-Niklaas.
The event started at 12:00 saturday and lasted through the night until 12:00 on sunday.
I participated together with my fellow art student Wilfried at the ‘1 hour expositions’ event in which every hour a new exposition started with art of the students.
We both showed 4 pieces - Wilfried showed his latest oil portraits while I showed my latest charcoal drawings from my ‘digital waves’ series.
We both had a great time and enjoyed our one hour of fame :P
I want to thank Wilfried for sharing his 1 hour spot with me and our teacher ‘Benny’ for making this happen.
The exhibition ‘Disegno (Drawing) - The drawing as a process’ is on display in the academy of Sint-Niklaas.
This exhibition consists of 2 parts in which drawing is represented as a process in all its facets - ’the result’ (part 1) and ’the sketch / design as the basis of an artistic process’ (part 2).
“Sketches and designs form the basis of an artistic process. They illustrate the often fascinating quest of artists and students. They show the process that precedes the product. However, the sketch can also stand on its own, as a diary fragment or independent work of art, in 2D or 3D The intimacy and vulnerability of the sketch shows very nicely how an artist follows a certain path and arrives at the end result.
We devote the second part to sketches by both contemporary artists and old masters, in addition to the sketchbooks and design drawings of our teachers and students from all degrees.”
In this 2nd part, sketches of the teachers and students of the academy are also exhibited. Including 4 sketches of myself from the digital waves art series.
The exhibition can be seen in the square room of the academy and runs from 6 April to 19 May 2019.