Sidi el Karchi/ Bas de Wit: Collective mysteries and personal snapshots at the Bonnefanten Museum

The Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht until the 27th June presents the double solo exhibition of the young artists Sidi el Karchi and Bas de Wit.

What connects the two artists is their origin in the Maastricht region. Both in their early thirties, they completed their studies at the Academy of Fine Arts (Academie van Beeldende Kunsten, or ABK) in Maastricht and belong to the same artistic generation.

However similarities in their work can be hardly discovered. Although they are both interested in figurative representation and the main focus of their work is the human figure, they essentially differ in its visualisation and conception.

Bas de Wit after completing his studies at the ABK Maastricht followed a residency programme at the Higher Institute for Fine Arts (HISK) in Antwerp. The Royal Painting prize (Koninklijke Prijs voor Vrije Schilderkunst) in 2008 was the first of several art prizes that marked the beginning of his career.

Sculpture, Bas de Wit

De Wit’s paintings and sculptures are dream works, possibly inspired by childhood memories and fantasies. He presents us characters from collective memories, such as clowns, pirates and mythological creatures, who at first glance might look threatening, provocative or scary, confronting us with our nightmares or fairy tales where “something went wrong”. In the end however he eases our discomfort with a witty gesture, as he puts it, a “last minute humour”. His creatures are taken out of their original environment and setting, becoming holders of new meanings.

Centauress, Bas de Wit

The exhibition opens with De Wit’s sculptures Toontje Lager and its doublet Monument voor Toontje Lager, which have recently found their place in the museum’s collection. Three African-Americans are seen carrying a massive, oversized ghetto blaster that looks like a coffin, with scared faces and closed eyes. The title of the work, Toontje Lager (Tone It Down) and the shape of their burden seem to evoke a funeral. The artist takes pleasure in a provocative play with social archetypes, using the common cliché image of black men carrying ghetto blasters or American jazz musicians who never stop playing and contrasting it with the figures’ silent and sober faces, which are copies of African death-masks.

Toontje Lager, Bas de Wit

De Wit intuitively develops the stories on canvasses by applying one layer of paint on top of the other. He leaves the canvasses half-naked, or filled with dark paint, thus allowing the viewer to complete the puzzle, to conceive his/her own story. In these fantasy micro-worlds many ideas can coexist without disturbing or interrupting each other.

The More You Cry the Less You Pee, Bas de Wit

De Wit certainly has a poetic talent for titles – The More You Cry the Less You Pee, Follow Your Bliss And Set Your Hair or Curse Me Now Love Me Later – which are not only amusing but often offer narratives to the visual image.

While his intentions on sculptures come across as more direct, there is always a lack of narrative on his canvasses. In his work De Wit generates a great puzzle, leaving his stories open and enlarging the number of possible meanings for the viewer.

Sidi El Karchi started his studies as an illustrator and graphic designer, but soon turned to painting in which he found his own way of representation. He lives and works in Sittard, 30 km to the north of Maastricht.

He always starts from a carefully chosen photograph, which he either takes himself or finds from his models. The origin of his work, unlike De Wit’s, is always reality. His colourful portraits are not trying to tell us a story, aim to grasp the atmosphere of an instant moment. By leaving out unnecessary details the artist creates flat images with no sense of perspective.

Rave, Sidi El Karchi

El Karchi seems to work very carefully, there is no random brushstroke or unintended shade on his paintings. As he confirmed during a studio visit, a long process takes place until the paint meets the canvas, starting with the choice of the right photograph, several sketches and finding out the right size for the paintings. A slight tension is created by the intimate, private moments that he depicts and the size of his canvasses which keeps some distance from the spectator.

Although he finds inspiration in daily life, his work could be labelled with attributes of magic realism, because of his dreamlike imagery. The models on his large sized paintings with vivid colours are most often his close friends, girlfriends or family members.

El Karchi completed one of his recent works, The Nomad (2009) after a visit to Morocco. The painting presumably alludes to his Moroccan family background. The portrayed man, veering a turban and a modern jacket under the starry sky gives a magical impression, his far away look evokes a meditative moment.

The Nomad, Sidi El Karchi

El Karchi enjoys constructing several identities by depicting himself in stereotypical roles: El Karchi as a dandy, as the ideological painter or as Van Gogh himself. The self-portrait, entitled The Actor (2004) inevitably recalls the work of the Dutch post-impressionist master. El Karchi painted himself wearing a straw hat and looking at the viewer with a searching, challenging look.

The Painter, Sidi El Karchi

In another self-portrait, The Painter, he depicts himself in blue working clothes, holding his palette, from which colourful strings reach to the sky. His exaggerated heroic pose and idealistic eyes turned to the sky make a slightly hilarious impression, reflecting his approach to painting. Although a painter has to work like everyone else, his devotion to the craft finds no boundaries, his work suggests.

“There is a whole world behind my paintings,” El Karchi says. The same statement could be applied to Bas de Wit’s work as well. They both stand on the borderline of reality and imagination, offering the viewer the opportunity to look beyond.

By Kristina Dittel

Kristina Dittel is a Hungarian-Slovakian master student of Arts and Heritage at Maastricht University. With her profound interest in visual arts and photography she quickly became engaged with cultural life in Maastricht.