Loneliness and Intrigue: Voyeurism in Cecile Broekaert's Artistic Expression

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Cecile Broekaert writes about her work:

My cardboard paintings are almost the size of a postcard, a vast collection of images that I keeps aligned in boxes like family pictures.

Fragments that can be regrouped in series or into typologies: landscapes, details, portraits, objects, plants, cityscape.

With their appealing colors, they might look innocent at first sight; pretty pictures, details of decorative objects.

But like make-up or masks, that’s only a façade, hiding an underlying feeling of melancholy or nostalgia for a time or place you’ve never known, also known as Anemoia.

A monotype print or an engraving sometimes hide under the layers of paint and oil pastels of these cinematographic nocturnal views.

I cover up and scratch the surface, carving shapes into the images.

Each faceless character becomes a palimpsest, the accumulation of different stories into a blurry memory.

These anonymous lonely figures are sleepless night workers, movie cowboys, children’s toys and dolls.

Glimpsing at them puts us into the position of a voyeur, like peeking through an illuminated window at night.” 

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Images and text courtesy the artist

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Images on view below:

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