The Wonder Room is one of the most beautiful concepts to have developed in the organic evolution of the property. It now includes the hotel’s restaurant and lobby. You would say, reason to make it even more well kept and beautiful. That was certainly the case when the hotel opened, but slowly but surely attention has waned.
But we are at it again in the context of which we asked Marc Mulders if he would show work until the Africa exhibition. Marc still has beautiful work, but he wants something special and he is right. He thinks the space is a bit dilapidated and doesn’t really want to hang work on the wall we have in mind. We agree and Steef is there too. Marc likes the long wall now, but it needs to be painted and on the walls opposite his work there should be complementary work by another artist. The crazy thing is that we brainstorm about it, but overlook the perfect match. The following day, the choice is made; Marc’s paintings will hang opposite the specially crafted ‘tile colour works’ by RENS (Steef and Renée). Marc’s fantastic works, created in symbiosis with nature in his studio, will be displayed opposite the work of Steef and Renée, who tackle colour and texture analytically and systematically. They have specially created works to accompany Marc’s paintings for the exhibition.
So it has now become an exhibition, rather than an interim fancy solution. Instead of making way for the Africa exhibition (Eindhoven-Dakar), featuring work by Bibi Seck, Sumah Hamidhou, Mambeye Ndiaye, Djibril Sagna, Ikevé Mbaye, Hans van Bentem and Piet Hein Eek, both exhibitions will open simultaneously on 17 May. That’s not all, as ‘art in the building’ as a concept is now really taking shape. At the same time, the exhibition ‘The Chair’ by José Maria Guijarro will open and 30 drawings by Marc Ruijgrok will be on display at la Petite Galerie.
The Colour Garden of Marc Mulders & Studio RENS
2025
Marc Mulders has invited design duo Studio RENS to respond to his paintings,
an artistic dialogue where colour, symbolism and form merge.
Together, they explore the interplay of colours in a world of flowers and plants.
Inspired by this, RENS captures the essence of colour interactions in ceramic.
Their pieces reflect the hues and organic vibrancy found in Mulders’ floral compositions, creating a
layered interplay between painting and material.
In The Colour Garden, pigments and textures intertwine, offering a sensory journey through the langua-
ge of colour.
The ceramics were produced in collaboration with Cor Unum Ceramics in ’s-Hertogenbosch.
The Chair by José Maria Guijarro
December 13, 1988. Back in Cologne.
The chair.
To sit on. To lean against the back of the chair. To leave clothes on it. To warm up by the brazier. To climb on to change a light bulb. To rest, eat, or work.
Every house has chairs. Every room has a chair, or there may be one. There are functional chairs, stylish chairs, noble chairs, popular chairs, common chairs, unique chairs.
The only necessary condition: a horizontal support for the buttocks and a vertical support, at an angle, for the back; the resulting angle can be absolutely right or obtuse between the planes and with respect to the floor. They can be large or small, with anatomical shapes or hard or soft planes, the same or different.
José María Guijarro
Irrational thoughts must be followed with absolute fidelity and logic. —If the artist changes his mind mid-course, he endangers the outcome and repeats past results. -The artist’s will is secondary to the process he or she sets in motion from idea to execution. Willpower is often just vanity.
Sol Lewitt
Eindhoven – Dakar
When I went to Dakar with Geertje, I hoped it would be as much fun as I thought it would be. It turned out to be much more fun and beautiful. I also vaguely thought about the possibility of somehow making contacts and starting collaborations. As I stood in my swimming trunks in front of the locked gate of the house we had rented, which I could not enter because the key had slipped out of the same trunks during a dip in the sea, it was hardly conceivable that the project I am now up to my ears in got off the ground precisely because of that. Rama, a neighbour, saw me standing in my swimming trunks talking to the gardener and thought; this is a curious setting. She asked if anything was wrong. She helped us get a spare key, we had a drink the next day and on the plane before we left, I texted her if she would help me with the Eindhoven-Dakar project. Without her, almost certainly none of what we did and what I wanted would have come to fruition.
I have been to Dakar three times now and we, or rather Rama, have been incredibly busy realising the products I designed, expanding the art collection and sourcing Senegalese products.
I am not resting my head and besides the scenario that nothing will come of it all, I also dream that we will sell well; that we will open a shop in Dakar because we have to collect the stuff somewhere for transport anyway or preferably a building where we also produce and thus have the shop, but also a gallery, restaurant and hotel like we have here. Production is well organised with machines, level floors, work tables, it is tidy and clean, the artisans enjoy coming to work and customers and guests from Dakar, Senegal and all over the world know the way. Anyway; nice dreams and super satisfied with the incredible results of an amazing adventure. My most soothing thought is that if, in the unlikely event that we don’t sell anything, we will be beautiful art and objects and, above all, a fantastic adventure richer. A kind of very exclusive holiday it was then!
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