Michaël Borremans: Fire from the Sun (Spotlight)

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I recall you once said that people either loved or were repelled by your work because of this beautiful painterly quality. That the main focus seemed to be how the painting was painted, and everything else got overlooked.

In 2011, Michaël Borremans: Eating the Beard, a comprehensive solo show, was presented at the Württembergischer Kunstverein Stuttgart, and traveled to the Műcsarnok Kunsthalle, Budapest, and the Kunsthalle Helsinki. In 2010, he had a solo exhibition at the Kunstnernes Hus in Oslo, as well as commissioned work on view at the Royal Palace in Brussels. Other venues that have hosted solo exhibitions include the kestnergesellschaft, Hanover (2009); de Appel Arts Centre, Amsterdam (2007); Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.), Ghent (2005), which traveled to Parasol unit foundation for contemporary art, London, and the Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin; Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio (2005); Kunsthalle Bremerhaven, Germany (2004); and Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel (2004). Embarking on a career as a painter relatively late, at the age of 33, Belgian artist Michaël Borremans initially trained as a draughtsman and engraver at Saint Lucas in Ghent. On the occasion of his inaugural exhibition Michaël Borremans: Fire from the Sun at the new David Zwirner space in Hong Kong (27 January–9 March 2018), I spoke with Borremans about his practice and his participation in the Biennale of Sydney (BoS) (16 March–11 June 2018). Somos Libres II: Works from the Mario Testino Collection, Pinacoteca Giovanni e Marella Agnelli, Turin [catalogue] While the fire and (probable) cannibalism imply some sort of ritual, the works are most chilling as sketches of random violence, causal and instinctual. The depicted characters break with one typecast (angelic) while fitting another (demonic). The review went on: "In the most evident terms, Fire From the Sun portrays children aged two or three in various stages of play with fire and what appear to be human limbs, even hair. The children are all light-skinned Sistine-style cherubs, sometimes covered in blood. The children do not appear to be distressed or disturbed (though some viewers at the gallery may be)."MBThere is an analogy with rituals, but it's never really clear, it's not specified. That's important for me in my work, to not define anything, to allow for different analogies so everybody can relate to it in a different way. DdYou ascribe a lot of importance to the viewer in completing the narrative. MBIt was overnight. It was like an epiphany. All of a sudden I knew I had to paint. One sudden moment it just came to me that I just had to paint. DdWhat was the first thing you painted? Published to accompany the inaugural exhibition at David Zwirner’s space in Hong Kong, Michaël Borremans: Fire from the Sun features new scholarship by British art critic, curator, and cultural historian Michael Bracewell. It marks the first in a series by David Zwirner Books of small-format publications devoted to single bodies of work. Michaël Borremans: The Advantage, Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo [catalogue] (solo exhibition)

There is a dialogue in your paintings with artists such as Goya, Velázquez and Manet, for example. What is it about these artists that appeals to you?

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Initially you were trained as an etcher. What prompted you to shift your focus to painting? What allure does painting hold for you? He started his fashion career at Maison Margiela, then worked at Louis Vuitton and Marc Jacobs before launching Vetements in 2014. He took over from Alexander Wang at Balenciaga in 2015. I love being gay, though I don't do it very much now': Out, proud and extremely loud, actress MIRIAM MARGOLYES, 82, is renowned for telling it as she sees it. She talks love and death... as well as laying off JK Rowling

Borremans, quoted in Daiga Rudzāte, “White Canvas Is Ugly: An Interview with Artist Michaël Borremans,” Arterritory.com, March 11, 2000. Then came living in Paris, which can be so xenophobic, and it escalated into a full-on identity crisis. MPs call for new law to help the one in three men over 65 living with incontinence by enforcing compulsory sanitary bins in male toilets MB[ Laughter] They didn't know anything. But I paid them. DdIt sounds quite Lynchian [the film director David Lynch]. Work by the artist is held in public collections internationally, including Art Institute of Chicago; Dallas Museum of Art; High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem; Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.), Ghent; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Borremans lives and works in Ghent.

David Zwirner

Sanguine/Bloedrood. Luc Tuymans on Baroque, Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen, Antwerp [itinerary: Fondazione Prada, Milan] [curated by Luc Tuymans] 2017 Michaël Borremans Selected Exhibitions in 2017:

Yeah, one of them. The Storm (2006) is a one-minute loop where you see three figures just sitting there. They were three guys who were acting in another film of mine but here they are just resting. They were young guys and they’d been out the night before on drugs and they were just sitting there. I saw them there by accident and told the cameraman ‘Please film this!’. And it was much better than the film I was working on. I threw away the other film and kept this. Michaël Borremans, The Storm (2006). Single-channel video, 1:07 mins, looped. Installation view: 21 stBiennale of Sydney, Artspace, Sydney (16 March–11 June 2018). Courtesy the artist and Zeno X Gallery, Antwerp. Photo: Document Photography. The 21st Biennale of Sydney (BoS) (16 March-11 June 2018) is titled SUPERPOSITION: Equilibrium and Engagement and examines the state of 'superposition' by exploring how it mightoperate in the world today. The word is derived from the world View Event Tylevich, in Michaël Borremans: The Acrobat. Exh. cat. (New York: David Zwirner Books, 2022), p. 26 Downton Abbey star Hugh Bonneville moves into 6,500 a month bachelor pad in Soho after splitting from Lulu Williams, his wife of 25 years Since opening its doors in 1993, David Zwirner has been home to innovative, singular, and pioneering exhibitions across a variety of media and genres. The gallery has helped foster the careers of some of the most influential artists working today, View Gallery ProfileIn 2007, he had a solo show at gallery De Appel in Amsterdam, focusing on his cinematic works. [6] In 2005, he had a one-person exhibition of paintings and drawings at the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.), Ghent. The paintings then traveled to Parasol unit foundation for contemporary art, London, and The Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin, while the drawings traveled to the Cleveland Museum of Art in Ohio. Other solo exhibitions include La maison rouge, Paris (2006); Kunsthalle Bremerhaven, Bremerhaven, Germany; and the Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel, Switzerland (both 2004). In 2004, he participated in Manifesta 5, The European Biennial of Contemporary Art. [7]