Van Renselar

Van Renselar

Modern art prints and original digital artworks on canvas by contemporary abstract artist Van Renselar.

ILLUSTRATIONS FROM LOST STORIES - THE ART OF VAN RENSELAR

Van Renselar grew up in South Wales, moving to Little Venice in his teens then on to Bromley, where he now lives and works.
As a contemporary abstract artist Van Renselar is more concerned with form and colour as an alternative to subject matter. It is not his aim to represent our surroundings or any particular object, he takes ideas from experiences which are visual, cerebral and emotional in nature. His inspiration can as easily be sparked by lines from a song as by an emotional event.

Colour is equally as important as the general design and Van Renselar will spend a lot of time perfecting the tone of a particular colour, his primary objectives being to establish harmony both in terms of composition and the use of colour. Across the range of pictures there is no defining key of symbols - there is no ‘language’ for the viewer to learn, each picture establishes itself on its own visual merits and the viewer’s interest.

As Van Renselar says, "I want to make pictures which involve and intrigue the viewer. I take ideas from around and within me, using intuition and imagination to create a new context. Much of my work stems from my subconscious, where I see actions, events and ideas as particular shapes and colours. It took me a long time to fully realise that not everyone translated the world in this way.”

Van Renselar describes himself as an abstract artist, yet his paintings sometimes utilise figurative elements - he explains: "These are spontaneous symbols, they are just things that occur to me when making the particular picture, hence their meaning can differ from picture to picture. They seldom have any meaning related to what they actually resemble. I don’t want my pictures to be understood - to me, deconstructing a picture would be like dividing a poem into its single words.

TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION OF VAN RENSELAR'S WORK
Van Renselar's work is created from disparate sources such as drawing (either on paper or directly onto screen), self-generated digital photography, painting and scanning. These separate elements are all collaged together on a computer into a digital file which is then output as a giclee and sealed. This methodology makes it possible for the final picture to be different sizes. This form of working is sometimes mistakenly called CGA (computer generated art) - a description Van Renselar rejects. The computer generates nothing at all, it is merely a ‘receptacle’ for collecting the different elements together - collage is a more accurate description.