Serieus Grappig
Performance and book presentation

Flemish artist Kristof Van Heeschvelde presents his performance Dit Is Mijn Name/This Is My Name at the IKOB, followed by the launch of his new book "Serieus Grappig" [Seriously Funny].

17:30: Performance Dit Is Mijn Name/This Is My Name

In this performance, artist Kristof Van Heeschvelde promotes his own name in public space by distributing various objects bearing his name without further explanation: pencils, flyers, wristbands, caps, posters. The performance is a critique of our social fascination with brands, which is also relevant in the art market.

18:30: Artist talk and book launch

With Kristof Van Heeschvelde, art critics Nicole Büsing und Heiko Klaas and publishers Hopper & Fuchs. "Serieus Grappig" provides a glimpse into an artist’s practice, where societal observations are translated into a personal visual language, with a focus on art historical references, language, spatiality, and painting techniques.

Kristof Van Heeschvelde is first and foremost a passionate painter and sketch artist who spends most of his time in his studio. He takes subjects for his paintings from two basically infinite reservoirs: on the one hand, his own, astute observations of everyday human life: everyday events, human idiosyncrasies, social phenomena, questionable norms and values, which he often treats with humour, subtle mockery and deliberate disregard. He is particularly interested in the inclusion and exclusion principles of a highly academicised art business, which he registers with great sensitivity as a career changer. Last but not least, selfportraits with an ironic charge also play a major role in his artistic universe. The second large reservoir of images that Van Heeschvelde taps into again and again is that of ‘serious’ art history, namely the late Middle Ages and the Baroque. He benefits from the sheer omnipresence of top-class works in the museums, churches and cathedrals of his home region of Flanders, by masters sych as Jan van Eyck (1390-1441) or Peter-Paul Rubens (1577-1640), to mention only the two most important. The adaptation of already existing, generally known pictures or elements of them is one of the basic constants of his painting. - Heiko Klaas & Nicole Büsing

Heiko Klaas has been working together with Nicole Büsing as a freelance art journalist and critic for numerous magazines, daily newspapers, and online magazines since 1997. In addition, they also write catalog articles. They live in Hamburg and Berlin. Regular publications on art and the art market e.g. in Kunstmarkt.com, Monopol, Artmapp, Hatjecantz.de, Artist Kunstmagazin, Artline, Spiegel online, DARE, Kultur & Gespenster, Photonews, Kunsttermine, Zeitkunst, Künstler-Kritisches Lexikon der Gegenwartskunst, Next Level, Art, Die Welt, Der Tagesspiegel, www. artlog.net, various regional daily newspapers such as Kieler Nachrichten, Weser-Kurier, Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung, Saarbrücker Zeitung, Südkurier, Nürnberger Nachrichten, Flensburger Tageblatt, Freie Presse, etc.

In collaboration with Hopper & Fuchs and Berserk Art Agency.