A visit to Art Brussels 2025
Brussels Expo in the North of the city, venue for the 42nd edition of Art Brussels
We’re about to exit Art Brussels 2025 and one of us goes: “I wish we could bring all the art that caught our eye into one space, instead of it being scattered out through all these booths”. This post is such a place.
What do we take away from the 42nd edition of the art fair? Acknowledging that this event showcases artwork likely to sell, we approached the fair with a focused perspective: we sought out figurative works in large formats, employing any technique that intrigued us. This spans oil painting, textile works with thread, stapled paper, and more.
Here are three key takeaways, listed in the order of our visit:
1. Brandon Lipchik (1993, USA) at Galerie Robert Grunenberg (Berlin)
Lives and works in Berlin.
A great artist to look at for inspiration and composition, Lipchik works on digital images that he then paints on canvas. We’ve just held a Drawing Sesh online workshop on “The Portrait as Storytelling”, and his work would’ve fit right in: figures are represented from an above angle, with compelling backgrounds, and seem to have escaped from some mad video game (we mean this as a compliment). Lipchik’s exploration of the relationship between digital and analog imagery makes his work particularly relevant today.
In the words of his gallery:
Lipchik’s images “are fantastical, grotesque, and decadent, forming a kaleidoscopic visual language where myth, technology, and magic intersect.”
Source: gallery website
More on Brandon’s work:
Website: brandonlipchik.com
Gallery: Robert Grunenberg
Instagram: @brandonlipchikstudio
A portrait by Brandon Lipchik, at the Robert Grunenberg Galerie booth
2. Lebohang Kganye (South Africa) at Patinoire Royale (Brussels)
Lives and works in Johannesburg.
Kganye’s work features striking images of her family drawn from personal albums. By transforming these photographic portraits into life-sized textile representations, she dignifies and revives the stories of relatives who lived through apartheid. The outcome is both elegant and moving.
In the words of the artist:
“While her work may resonate with a particularly South African experience, it critically engages with oral tradition as form and memory, as a tangible source material. Kganye uses mainly her family archive to explore and re-enact notions of home and belonging, she employs narrative to tell stories of home, refuge, family and identity.” Source: artist website
Kganye's exhibition at Patinoire Royale in Saint-Gilles runs until June 7, 2025.
More on Lebohang’s work:
Website: lebohangkganye.co.za
Instagram: @lebohang_kganye
Gallery: Patinoire Royale
A painting by Matthew Hansel, at the Rodolphe Janssen Gallery
3. Matthew Hansel (1977, USA) at Rodolphe Janssen Gallery (Brussels)
Lives and works in Brooklyn.
A master of figurative storytelling, Hansel infuses surrealism into all his paintings. Nude figures contemplate vast skies, and hybrid forms resembling Bosch’s creations are rendered with hyperrealistic detail, seemingly brought to life. Influenced by Flemish painting and surrealism, Hansel’s work feels particularly at home in Belgium.
In the words of his gallery:
“The paintings of Matt Hansel traverse a liminal terrain located between the morbidly beautiful and the gruesomely delightful. Employing a menagerie of art historical tropes ranging from 16th Century European painting to American modernism, Hansel meticulously constructs surreal tableaus that contort the very logics of dreamscape.” Source: gallery website
More on Matthew’s work:
Instagram: @matt.hansel
Gallery: Rodolphe Janssen