Size:
180×135 cm
Year:
2024
Series:
Postpartum Garden
Petrichor
Aldo van den Broek & Johnny Mae Hauser
Acrylics on velvet w/ wooden frame
Aldo van den Broek is a self-taught artist whose work explores themes of decay, transformation, power, and identity. Shaped by life on the margins, he is drawn to entropy—the collapse of systems. For him, decay fuels renewal, revealing resilience in unstable environments.
Using discarded materials—such as cardboard, wood, metal, and fabric—his process of layering, scraping, and rebuilding reflects cycles of destruction and regeneration. These materials bear the marks of time, symbolizing both fragility and the potential for transformation.
Through his work, van den Broek challenges institutional, political, and social systems by exposing the vulnerabilities of the people within them. His figures, emerging from textured surfaces, embody the impermanence of identity, shaped by external forces and internal conflict.
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“In Postpartum Garden, I’m like a watchtower caught at the edge of her transformation—something intoxicating, almost dangerous, where light and shadow cling to each other like roots entwined in the soil.” - Aldo van den Broek
Postpartum Garden
Drawing from the cycles of nature and motherhood, Aldo van den Broek reimagines the garden in Postpartum Garden as both a sanctuary and a labyrinth, embodying shifts in identity and emotion. As an observer, he reflects on its ongoing
transformation.
Having lived for months in a tent near fertile soil, van den Broek incorporates this experience into his layered paintings, evoking themes of growth and decay. In contrast, his new series of velvet works strips away these layers, revealing a raw immediacy akin to direct expression. Symbols of transformation are painted on untouched velvet, as fragile and direct as new life. The softness and tonal strokes juxtapose fragility with strength, encapsulating the resilience of motherhood, as observed by Aldo van den Broek.
The garden emerges as a reflective space, inviting viewers to engage with the complexities of motherhood from a
thoughtful distance.