Bas Meeuws

Born in the Netherlands in 1974, Bas Meeuws' work breathes new life to the XVIIth century Dutch and Flemish still life genre. Using photography as a base, he draws on his catalogue of over 13,000 species to create artworks in the line of Ambrosius Bosschaert (1573-1621) or Jan Davidsz de Heem (1606-1684). Demonstrating the same descriptive precision, he orchestrates an extraordinary diversity of flowers, here and there enlivened by insects or gastropods. The neutral background added to the dramatic chiaroscuro creates a focus on the foreground where movement seems to be gushing all around. Each look at the artwork unveils a detail precedently unnoticed, hence creating a constantly renewed image.

This tamed vision of nature however only abides by its own rules for it displays a mix of flowers which have different blooming times without any concern for scale. Additionally, Meeuws differentiates himself from his predecessors by adding what we consider today as bad seeds or ordinary grass. Indeed, his goal is to remind us of the transience and frailty of life as well as to awaken a broader sense of respect towards everything nature has to offer.

Since 2010, Bas Meeuws' artworks have been added to many private and public collections in the Netherlands such as the Rijksmuseum Muiderslot in Muiden or the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Additionally, they have found a strong resonance in Taiwan as well as in India where they are now part of the Bangalore Museum of Photography's collection. His body of work has recently been compiled in a book entitled "Flower Pieces" published by Lannoo Editions.