Arjan van Helmond paints scenes which resonate with the presence of people, but from which their inhabitants are absent. Working mostly on a small scale he paints onto paper with acrylic, gouache, watercolour and ink. He uses each medium with an acute control of its properties: a surface breaks to reveal conflicting underpainting; the gentle seep of watercolour or ink jars harshly with the blank opacity of an area of gouache. The scenes he chooses are often domestic or architectural, buildings which in their very structure, or in the decorative details which define their surfaces, bear signs of habitation, but stand invariably deserted.
Van Helmond works from photographs, and his working process consists in effecting subtle changes to each image until it takes on an element of the strange or the uncanny. Many of his subjects appear fragile, they have a clear origin in reality but have been pushed away from the realm of the real to occupy something like the realm of the dream.
Arjan van Helmond Ceiling#2 2005 Gouache and acrylic on paper 75 x 57 cm Courtesy of Juliette Jongma Gallery, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
