Michaël de Kok | From Dusk till Dawn

My first confrontation with the paintings of Michaël de Kok was a few years ago in Museum De Pont in Tilburg, where he was offered a wonderful exhibition. A second museum meeting followed a few weeks ago in the Noordbrabants Museum. In our new showrooms at Keizersgracht 321 we would like to show you a nice selection of his recent paintings.

Michaël de Kok's paintings often appear monochrome, but on closer inspection they are actually not. He applies paint, exclusively oil paint, in many transparent layers, often working from dark to light, always with a minimal nuance in tone. Suggestions of scenery of dusk and dawn, 'From Dusk till Dawn', grand and compelling theatrical or subtle like the color of a rose in his garden, are masterfully painted and can be felt or even recognized as such. What stands out is a perfect sense of color and tonality. With this flawless control of color, Michaël de Kok is able to interpret every depiction of landscape or abstraction as well as every emotion in a painterly manner.

The painting is created in his head, a thought process that requires a lot of time and reflection. That is where the art is created. What follows, in his terms, is skill. The hands as craft tools in the service of art. His painting technique is first revealed up close, only then the extremely subtle stroke of the brush or flat brush is released.

Paul van Rosmalen