Cathédrale

Axel Janssen is a painter but also a sculptor. He has just graduated from the Académie royale des beaux-arts de Liège where he was noticed by his teachers and me, kindly invited, from his very first jury. We immediately detected in his work a maturity that would make his fellow classmates envious. There is a lot of commitment and strength, it is a very physical painting. The guy is big, his paintings too! He has recently ventured into the hereafter. Good luck to L(o)ui(s) (him)! Chin up above all!

I was won over by his Cathédrale when I discovered it at the Georges Collignon prize which he won while he was still a student. A flourishing start that he will now have to confirm. Good luck again! This massive painting, bordering on sculpture, presented up high, pleasantly subjugated me. For Art au Centre #13, the painting is hung almost identically, imposing, except that this time the artwork has something in front of itself to compete with… the Palace of the Prince-Bishops, located on the other side of the street.

Maxime Moinet

This painting embodies the impression of almost mountainous hugeness that the view of Cologne Cathedral left on me. I made it from a picture taken at the foot of its highest tower.

Part of my work revolves around formal questions that are connected to certain feelings that architecture leaves on me. How do we get to such forms, such aesthetics? To what extent does our environment condition these structures and where can we find it? We are the only species that modifies its environment so much. It currently resembles who we are more than its original state. Are we trapped in a loop that is doomed to become more and more impoverished?

For me, Cologne Cathedral embodies one of the human scale structures that most clearly highlights the gap between our original environment and ourselves. Many architectures surpass it, by far, but in my opinion, they are beyond our humanity and refer to the picture of our mechanical and digital era.