Patrick van Caeckenbergh

They say that Belgian artist Patrick van Caeckenbergh lives like a hermit.  But this is not the way he perceives it, like he mentioned in an interview some time ago. He does lead a very solitary  life in a small Flemish village, but his fellow villagers are extremely fond of him.  This works both ways, as becomes clear every September when he organizes a procession through the village,  a homage to the village and its inhabitants.

To stay close to the most recent theme he is working on: Patrick van Caeckenbergh is an avid collector, which manifests itself by the gathering of knowledge. Knowledge about himself and knowledge about the earth and life in general has his preference. In trying to grasp what the world is about, he is a voracious reader of popular scientific books and magazines.

When he finds images of interest while consulting encyclopedias, atlases or other means of reference, he cuts them out  and arranges them in similar catagories after which he assembles his collection of cut-outs in collages, sculptures and books crafted by hand.

In this way he collected images of all kinds of parrots and created a magnificent collage titled “The oracle of parrots from the Gods”. I  made a scan of the collage depicted below which does not do it much justice.  But when you take a good look you can see an enormous quantity of parrots quietly sitting on the shore or fluttering around.  

In this piece of art, representing a tree of life, which is dedicated to the phenomenon of facial blushing,  van Caeckenbergh made use of his extensive collection of cut-outs of blushing cheeks.