Alain Biltereyst
Brussels (Belgium), 1969
Alain Biltereyst (1965) draws attention to the innate beauty of practical designs, such as a manhole cover, fence design or airplane tail logo. He works primarily on thick panels and focuses on layering and repetition and has an affinity for certain motifs of colour and shape. With a background as a graphic designer he has always been fascinated by the graphic idiom on the streets.
Biltereyst salvages gems of colour, shape, and placement in our everyday advertising and design, and isolates their forms. He tweaks the colours in logos and designs, so that the resulting diminutive works operate in the space between a precious object and fragment of the design canon. The carefully chosen scale and brushy, over-painted surfaces draw the viewer in to a beautifully crafted homage to the world of advertising and design that surrounds him.
Through tile-like panels and larger works, Biltereyst celebrates the parallels between historical abstraction and the commonplace and treats his source material as a precious find. De Stijl, that pursues unity between life and art, is omnipresent in our environment and via the streets this imagery becomes visible in Biltereyst’s work. He adores the minimal shapes and colours, and pure art, as did the pioneers of De Stijl at the time.
Recent solo exhibitions include Not Just Because at Devening Projects, Chicago (VS), Elsewhere at Loods12, Wetteren (BE), Slow, Simple, Sweet at Brand New Gallery, Milan (IT), Dear Everyday at Nogueras Blanchard, Barcelona (SP), MORE OR LESS at Galeria Múrias Centeno, Porto (PT), and Geo Land at Jack Hanley Gallery. Biltereyst also participated in The B&W Project #5 at Transmitter, Brooklyn (VS), Form Follows Function? at Art Center Hugo Voeten, Herentals (BE), Spaghetti Code at Viewing Room, Los Angeles (VS), The Story Behind: Untitled Compositions at Nogueras Blanchard, Barcelona (ES), Street Geometries at Gallerie Van der Mieden, Brussels (BE) and Notes at Devening Projects, Chicago (VS). Biltereyst participated in Chaste Paper at Sotheby’s Gallery, New York (VS). Other exhibitions include ON WHITE at Geukens & De Vil Gallery in Antwerp (B), PLIAGE / FOLD at Gagosian Gallery, Paris (FR), 30/30 CCNOA at A/B/Contemporary, Zurich (DE) and Solo at The Secret Kitchen Gallery in Temse (BE).
