Memento Mori

Painting also takes centre stage in Hans Segers' work. The artist begins with ‘discovered images,’ extracting them from their original contexts. These images ‘span the spectrum of pictorial representations of 'reality'’: from art history to frescoes, advertising posters, and naive paintings. “A farmer presenting his cheese on a 'farm sale' sign, a Spanish church floor mosaic.” Hans Segers reassembles these images in novel configurations, reflecting on the inherent nature of painted images: the interplay between representation and content, authenticity and mimesis... Thus, he stages a water basin three times against a grid of squares or positions a water basin with a flat shadow edge centrally against a checked pattern. The visible brushstrokes underscore their status as painted images. How do these representations relate to reality? What appears flat, and what suggests volume? What role does shadow play, and where does an illusion of space or ‘trompe-l'œil’ emerge? The connections between the water basins remain ambiguous. Where does the water originate, and where does it flow? Is there a height differential that dictates the flow? Are these floating objects within an abstract field, or do they stand adjacent on a tiled square? These images construct their own reality, inviting diverse interpretations. A water source in an urban landscape might double as a floating island between two black holes.