Or: WHO THE FUCK IS FLAUM VAN KREUZEN? OR WHAT? And why?

Simple: It’s a side project I began in Summer 2020. Here’s what it’s all about, and below is an overview of work created.

You can also check for available artwork here, or get the catalogue here. And as always - you can ask me anything using this contact form.

The Background

The art of Flaum van Kreuzen is best characterized by it’s technique (or rather the lack of it) and a work process that can be described as „irreversible decision making“. There is no concept in the beginning, no sketch, not even a basic groundwork laying out any obvious thoughts in this approach. It is purely honest, unpretentious, unintentional and unfiltered - and a litte bit lost.

This way, no painting is the same, there are only few repetitive elements or patterns that are applied to, say, a series of work. Every single painting is a new beginning with an unforeseeable result for the artist. Sure, there may be an identifiable style and certain basic recurrent factors, and maybe even a few similar ones, but nothing is following a greater plan. The vision of van Kreuzen is simple: let everything go, just roam free until you find the moment the work is finished - or let it find you.

However, you can not deny craftsmanship and experience within the work. It is not about being untrained, unskilled or even unacademic, it is about forgetting what has been learned to open a way for truth and poetry through this open-minded, intuitive and often destructive process.

The aforementioned „irreversible decision making“ is the key factor in the studio. By layering multiple backgrounds on top of each others - or even painting upon painting - going back into the surface again and again, ripping parts away afterwards, by accident and deliberately, disassembling already constructed surfaces using whatever is available at the moment, van Kreuzen creates effects that simply can not be repeated, or even covered up if it all goes wrong. There is neither flaw nor genius in the artists‘ impulsive and immediate decision.

The message? Abstract painting makes it difficult, but if you can decipher or even read it: We need a better world. One where assholes don’t run the asylum, one where we feed everyone and save the ones needing to be saved, where riches are shared and killing, racism, oppression and greed are not tolerated but fought. The anger in the work is also directed at the often greedy, self-indulgent, egomaniacal, narcissistic, illoyal and purely capitalistic part of the art world.

To achieve „all this“, van Kreuzen-paintings are created in a punk-rock kind of way, destroying pencils and brushes and surfaces and using (as well as trashing) all kinds of materials, found and constructed, on a path to create a visionary result that is as intense as it is fragile.

Flaum van Kreuzen is a new artistic outlet by Jörg Heikhaus. No secret Spin-Off, no alternative reality, it is just like another band project - like Mike Patton crossing lines between Mr. Bungle and Tomahawk. Alex Diamond and his trademark woodcuts will most likely remain Jörg’s main artistic endeavor, this excursion into abstraction simply gives him the opportunity to go completely outside the box.

Flaum van Kreuzen does not strive to be anyone or anything the art world needs. It’s just another way to create to the rhythm of a different drum.

The Artwork