About the work

The work of Pieter Slagboom is a poetic analysis of contemporary society. At the same time, his pencil drawings visualise his inner world. They are replete with personal symbols and refer to existential themes. His idiosyncratic and distinctive style of using curling and shaded pencil lines in a variety of bright colours, portrays confronting and mysterious scenes.

There are many antitheses in the work, both in terms of form and themes. A recurring theme is the individual in conflict, trapped in between cultural and social norms on the one hand and biologically driven behaviour on the other. In particular, the coercion that religion and culture exert on the body and the intellect.

The technique in the recent works is such that the revelation of the subject matter is slow. This gives the viewer the time to process the layered structure of the motives. The images maybe cause the viewer to instinctively turn away. But whoever keeps looking, sees an inner world of absurd rituals and personal and social symbols not readily interpretable.

Scale and format are not mere formal aspects of his work, but also relate to the content. Starting with oil paintings measuring 9 x 12 cm twenty years ago he recently works with coloured pencil on large linen canvases measuring 300 x 500 cm. In these works intimacy becomes a monumental quality and relates itself to space. The activity of colour is such that it does not underline the subject matter but rather detaches it. As a result, the colour has not an aesthetic function. This gives the work as a whole a specific manifestation of colour. In some works the technique symbolizes the substance.

About the artist

PIETER SLAGBOOM was born in the Netherlands. He received his MA in 1981 from the Academy of Art and Design St. Joost, in Breda, the Netherlands.

Intellect plays a major role in Slagboom’s work, which frequently draws from the fields of religion, biology, architecture and art history. His work focuses exclusively on drawing, and has been shown at venues including: Albada Jelgersma Gallery, the Netherlands; Vleeshal Middelburg, the Netherlands; Stedelijk Museum Schiedam, the Netherlands; and Bridget Donahue, New York.

He won the Vleeshal Art Prize in 2018.

More work by Pieter Slagboom