Rob van Koningsbruggen

Rob van Koningsbruggen (1948) studied at the Royal Academy of Art and the Free Academy in The Hague. His oeuvre consists of paintings, drawings, and knitted artworks. The artist, born in The Hague, was one of the leading figures of “fundamental painting,” a movement that from the 1970s onward investigated the basic principles of painting.

In 1968, Van Koningsbruggen began making drawings consisting of simple abstract forms or banal texts that were endlessly repeated until structures emerged. These works reveal an admiration for Jan Schoonhoven, for whom Van Koningsbruggen had great respect because of Schoonhoven’s handwriting, which was at once searching and hesitant, yet also deliberate and convincing.

Harmony, composition, or other academic principles were deliberately avoided throughout the various artistic phases of Van Koningsbruggen’s career. His aim is simply to make a good painting. Such a painting must arise from tension, be unprecedented, and be unforeseen—something that in hindsight would not even have seemed possible. It is “good” when the paint ceases to be form and matter and disappears into the act of looking at the painting.

After a long period of searching, Van Koningsbruggen arrived in 1974 at his so-called “sliding paintings.” For these works—which he would later regard as his best—he used two canvases that he coated with paint. Initially only black and white were used; later, primary colors were added. One canvas stood on the easel, while he held the other and slid it across the first. With this rigorous concept, Van Koningsbruggen strove for art that makes itself, in which his own influence on the final result was minimal.

After making sliding paintings had lost its tension in 1979, Van Koningsbruggen embarked on a new path, focusing on (bright) colors and the confrontation between them. Now applied with a brush and incorporating figurative elements such as a circle or a funnel, yet still without recognizable composition or harmony. In this way, Van Koningsbruggen continues to place himself outside his work, switching off the artist’s ego so that the paintings can transcend themselves.

Van Koningsbruggen has had several major solo exhibitions, including at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, and the Kunstmuseum Den Haag. His work is also included in the collections of these museums.