May 19

Cécile van Hanja

Cécile van Hanja is an interior and architectural painter who has exhibited across Europe especially in the Netherlands. Countries where Cécile has exhibited include the United Kingdom, France, Belgium, Germany, Spain, Switzerland and she has also shown in New York City. Her work remains in collections across Europe, Japan, and the United States. Cécile has participated in several residencies including most recently at the Port Tonic Art Center in Les Issambres, France. Publications include several international magazines and most notably on Saatchi Art’s Inside the Studio and Canvas A Blog.

The paintings focus on contemporary architecture and interiors often interacting with water such as outdoor and indoor pools and depicting seaside homes and resorts. Cécile’s focal point can be witnessed in the geometric and monotone shadows and reflections in the compositions. Blocks of form and intense geometry are a central tenet of these structures. The colors range from neutral tones in some works such as whites, grays, and earth hues while other paintings have bold pastel colors bordering with an almost neon brightness. Some of the works appear representational while others come off as more abstracted with an intense blocking off of forms with monotone colors.

Pool Light (pictured above) and Pool Reflections (pictured below) are among Cécile's most unusual paintings as they are depicted in close up cropped scenes of interiors instead of cropped wide angles. The paintings focus on indoor pools, however what makes them peculiar remains the portrayal of water contained inside entire interior rooms instead of being within a room. Although Pool Reflections remains so cropped the painting could pass for an outdoor pool as well. Containing linear streaks of blue light and solid forms of color, these monochromatic paintings have a unified presence with their tight compositions and related tones. The compositions range from a diamond to a shape of a Z as the subject remains carefully and forcefully controlled to guide the eye towards the left side on both paintings. With dramatic lighting the illumination becomes present coming from different directions as if there were fixtures installed on the ceilings. Notably the stairs in Pool Reflections are painted in a way in which the stairs could lead through either direction, however the guard rail indicates the stairs are meant to be descending rather than ascending.

Cécile van Hanja offers therapeutic art by having the viewer’s eyes rest on geometric harmony in the forms of contemporary architecture and interior design. These pristine and mostly monochromatic paintings display light and form with such complexity yet with a sense of balance and nuance which indicates careful observation without stiffness or rigidity. In essence the paintings are a celebration of contemporary design, aesthetics, and principles. By using the dimensional nature of contemporary subject matter, Cécile explores the relationship of minimal spatial environments. These grand paintings are a testament as to how contemporary representational art can be differentiated towards both illusion and abstracted formulations.