It’s that time of the year again! After months of being locked inside his art lair and diligently working on things only he can, Christian Rex van Minnen is sharing his latest mental and painterly exercises w the fellow earthlings. Moments like his new solo show, which opened this weekend at Nanzuka Underground in Tokyo, aren’t seasonal or tied to natural cycles, but they still have a similar effect on the people who follow and appreciate his output and practice.
As you can see from the photos I've received from the gallery, the work is divided into 2 parts: the first is the iconic, brain-bending, unmistakably bonkers Van Minnen masterpieces, while the second is more traditional, still-life/fruit compositions. And however difficult it might be to believe or see them that way, both the esoteric, floral-arrangement-like explosions and the archetypal tabletop fruit bowls are equally impressive and significant.
The idiosyncratic compositions built from made-up, transformed, and real references are not only incredible in their technical superiority and unique use of traditional techniques, but also deceptive in their construction and conceptualization. Rendered flawlessly and with utmost precision down to every hair on a fur collar or the light glistening on jelly, the paintings appear meticulously planned. Yet they are born from an immediate, strictly unplanned, automatic drawing. The initial marks made spontaneously are the basic construction of the work, which takes shape from there by transforming those into familiar shapes and/or entirely speculative forms (both alive and inanimate). With that, the process undergoes a significant shift into the realm of meticulous planning, familiarity with tools, techniques, and materials, and reveals an immense passion, knowledge, and appreciation for the alchemic painterly tradition.
And it’s this painterly tradition that shapes the smaller-scale still life works debuting in this show. Working with the ubiquitous trope, in particular, fruits and other natural elements, he is adopting the tradition like never before. In a way, going against his own principles and constructs that informed his practice as we know it today. And while, yes, these small-scale works are exceptionally painted, what I didn't expect to see is how well they fit with their younger brothers and sisters (which this pairing presentation displays beautifully). Even more so, how his language and his touch are still evident, even in these most classical arrangements. Far from the grotesqueness of tattooed flesh, levitating pseudo-alien beings, formalin-filled vases, glowing jelly, or any of that iconic stuff, one can still sense his presence behind the depiction of a single tulip, an apple, or an iridescent shell.
Now, I’m no painter myself, and I’ll always find it amazing how a good painter manages to convey the proportions, depth, perspective, colors, and even the texture of their motif. But it goes beyond my understanding how all that can then be further placed in a distinctive ambience, in a certain light setting, and become part of a larger story, regardless of how different and seemingly unconnected the other chapters might be. So, while Metanoia might imply a "change in one's way of life resulting from penitence or spiritual conversion," or simply a "change of mind or heart," we see here that it's still the same mind and heart behind these two, seemingly (and literally) centuries apart bodies of work. —Saša Bogojev
