Geert Goiris is a Belgian artist
Episode 144: This is the second episode with Geert Goiris and artist whose work and friendship have come to mean a great deal to me. He has a new book 2020 published with Roma Publications. I am intent to continually cover Geert’s work as he launches new projects.
Geert Goiris 2020
His new book sounds like a pandemic book given the title, but it does not have that much to do with life under Covid-19. The book instead is a consideration of the new chapel designed by Tom Callebaut built on the historic Wivina site at Groot-Bijgaarden in Belgium. The site dates back to the 12th Century and is an important spiritual site. The original chapel was destroyed centuries ago, but has been re-imagined and re-built by Callebaut. The architecture of the site is beautiful. The use of sequestered glass ornamentation and the considered use of light and natural elements such as sand give the space a contemplative engineering that also persuades the viewer to be at once within the natural world and protected from the elements. It is a very considered build.
Geert Goiris 2020
Perhaps it seems strange the Goiris has found interest in photographing the chapel for people who know his work. However, in my estimation this study, which was a commission fits perfectly within Goiris’s oeuvre. There is the consideration of structure and architecture in most of his previous books and bodies of work and his interest in the perception of modernist tendencies in his work is one of the key tenets within. He is also interested in the fantastic whether it be the apocalyptical or sublime use of art. Though a commission, the subject matter and the architect’s decisive use of material and color seem at home in Geert’s work.
Geert Goiris 2020
In the episode we speak about 2020 and also the book. We, without intention, ended up speaking for some amount of time on cinema which was incredibly fun as we both seem to appreciate and dislike some of the myth of Lars Von Trier and films. It was an enjoyable sequence and I hope it helps to illuminate more about Geert and his work. One of the major takeaways from this episode was to speak with Geert about the idea of making images that have a spiritual or religious side. I am more and more interested in the idea of the sacred in art and I believe it is something that we have set down over the last 100 years. Please tune in. It gives me great satisfaction to continue Geert’s biography.
Geert Goiris 2020
