Casper Faassen
Mado I, 2020
Oil paint, color and white print on setasand
120 x 100 cm
Edition of 5 plus 2 artist's proofs
Looking at Casper Faassen's work is like gazing through the mist of time. The artist, who has a studio in Leiden - the birthplace of Rembrandt - draws his inspiration from classical paintings he encountered as a child in the Netherlands. He approaches the vanitas genre of stilllife-paintings from a new perspective and developed a unique visual language by combining photography, painting and the application of „craquelé".
"Here we are, caught in the middle. Falling, soaring or floating. I see now
that most of my recent works depict that moment where gravity seems lost and we don't clearly see where we are or where we are going. We levitate. The juxtaposition between the eternal and the temporal, beauty and decay, appearing and disappearing is my main theme. All painters and photographers have the ability to freeze time and capture a single moment. I emphasize that moment by adding an element of time - not necessarily by using literal vanitas references but through the handling of materials. I do that through the use of an oil paint craquelure layer, contrasting the blurry image. Most of the distance is created by the way the picture is taken, through a matte medium. I print the image on to that same matte medium giving a further sense of distance. The layered image refers more to painting than photography and gives the viewer a sense of ease looking at it. We are not in the same place, the subject is unaware of our presence."
Casper Faassen
