Wim Delvoye

An event of the LOW Dutch-Fle­mish Cul­t­u­ral Fes­ti­val, Bu­da­pest 2008
www.​low​fesz​tiva​l.​hu

You can love it or hate it: Wim Del­voye, en­fant ter­rib­le of the con­tem­por­ary scene, makes art that can­not go un­no­ti­ced. These pro­vo­ca­tive works, which make emp­ha­tic use of an­ta­gon­isms, flout con­vent­ions and dog­mas. His raw hon­esty and gro­tes­que hu­mo­ur will make you both laugh and won­der.

It is im­pos­sib­le not to no­ti­ce a kins­hip with ear­li­er Bel­gi­an art. His works re­so­na­te with Ensor's sca­to­log­i­cal/obs­ce­ne hu­mo­ur, Mag­rit­te's aus­te­re ab­surd­ism, Bro­odt­ha­ers' in­te­rest in the uns­po­ken rules of the world of art. Del­voye's art ce­le­b­ra­tes pa­ra­dox, which is based on the Bel­gi­an sur­re­a­list tra­di­ti­on, the con­joi­ning of two dif­fe­rent ele­ments/ideas in the same work. The gas cy­lin­ders pain­ted in the style of Delft por­ce­la­in; the teak wood conc­re­te mixer with ba­ro­que or­na­men­ta­ti­on; pain­ted glass win­dows with sex sce­nes; ex­cava­tors in the style of got­hic cat­hed­rals: they all re­fe­ren­ce, in their pe­cu­li­ar man­ner, the his­to­ry of Fle­mish art.

His cre­a­tive met­hods ex­tend from simp­le dra­wing to real tat­too, from stuf­fed ani­mals to bron­ze casts, from ins­tal­la­ti­on to live pigs, from lipstick marks to X-ray pho­tos. If his works are often heavy, mas­sive, they are al­ways vib­rant with play­ful ideas and an iro­nic over­to­ne.
Bes­ide the pigs tat­to­o­ed with ela­bo­ra­tely de­tai­led Har­ley-Da­vid­son and Walt Dis­ney mo­tifs, his pro­ba­bly best-known work is Clo­a­ca, which he has pre­pa­red in eight vers­ions. The large ins­tal­la­ti­on is a comp­lex de­vi­ce that mo­dels human dig­est­ion. It has a mouth, a sto­mach, a du­o­de­num and a panc­re­as, con­tainers with enzy­mes, and a belt con­veyor, which pro­du­ces, when re­gu­larly fed, the end re­sult, i.e. exc­re­ment.

Born in 1965, Wim Del­voye lives and works in Gent. He ear­ned in­ter­na­ti­o­nal re­cog­ni­ti­on with such high-pro­fi­le ex­hi­bit­ions as the Ve­ni­ce Bi­en­nale in 1990 and 1999, and the Do­cu­men­ta 9 in 1992.

Pre­sen­ted in Ernst Mus­e­um, the ex­hi­bit­ion of­fers an over­view of the Fle­mish ar­tist's work to date.

Tá­mo­ga­tók/Sup­port­ers: Mi­nistry of Fo­rei­gn Af­fa­irs of the Net­her­lands, Em­bassy of the King­dom of the Net­her­lands, Mi­nistry of Edu­ca­ti­on, Cul­tu­re and Sci­en­ce, Ser­vi­ce Cent­re for In­ter­na­ti­o­nal Cul­t­u­ral Ac­ti­vi­ti­es / SICA, Em­bassy of Bel­gi­um - Fle­mish Rep­re­s­en­ta­ti­on, Fle­mish Aut­ho­ri­ti­es