Barbara Seiler

Comprising a great diversity of artistic forms – drawing, painting, collages, prints, sound and text pieces – the work of Dutch artist Marijn van Kreij (*1978, Middelrode, NL) is engaging with and reflecting upon todays almost infinite dissemination of images and the divergence of categories such as original and reproduction. In a persistent dialogue with the history of 20th century modern art, Van Kreij unfolds a serious but joyful play of repetition and difference, for instance, by using a mundane, mass-produced object such as the inside pattern of an envelope as the starting point for a series of drawings and large scale paintings on paper. In the course of the process of manual reproduction, that among others entails a change in scale and color, the industrial quality of the repetitive geometric pattern is being thwarted by the act of painting (or drawing) itself, leaving the relationship between the source and the final image and the status of this image, somewhere between abstraction, representation and appropriation, unclear.

Another more recent series of work is based on reproductions of paintings by modernist artists such as Paul Klee, Pierre Bonnard and Pablo Picasso; Van Kreij chooses a small detail from their paintings as a point of departure to create large scale works on paper that feature the same detail numerous times in a strict order, yet again, within the process of repetition, the artist deliberately chooses to focus on the differences and flaws, creating colorful abstract patterns, only hinting to their figurative origin.

Van Kreij’s first solo exhibition at Barbara Seiler titled According to Klee the Artist Should Create Like Nature – a loose note from Ad Reinhardt’s uncollected writings – serves as an overview or introduction to the artist oeuvre as such. Yet some elements appear in different formations. Recently the artist has been focussing on life-size collages as a way to investigate further formal artistic qualities like composition, size and the act of painting.

Rather than concentrating on one visual language, Van Kreij developed a way of working in which he avails himself of all kinds of ‘image-making’. In this process-based approach textual elements play an important role. The combination of different forms of abstract imagery and sentences referencing pop-songs or quotes by other artists activates the ambiguous quality of both image and text and refers to the infinite possibilities of how associative chains and networks of meaning can be developed and consolidated and how they can rupture as well. “My work isn’t about references and inside jokes, but stems from free associations and is riddled with contradictions. This freedom and openness is exactly what it’s about, not rigid concepts.”

Marijn van Kreij lives and works in Amsterdam. He studied at AKV St. Joost, Breda, and was a resident at the Rijksakademie voor Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam in 2005 and 2006. Recent solo exhibitions include He Who Sings Is Not Always Happy at AND/OR, London (2013), Riffs and Variations, Galerie Paul Andriesse, Amsterdam (2012) and How to Look Out, Museum De Hallen, Haarlem (2011). His work is currently presented in the following group exhibitions: Beating around the bush – Episode #2, Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht; High Horizon – Breugelland: early 21st century, Stedelijk Museum, Lier (BE); Beyond the Visible, Noordbrabants Museum, ’s-Hertogenbosch and In The Dark, Zeeuws Museum, Middelburg.