Artist of the day: Artist of the day, April 18: Frans Muhren, Dutch sculptor, painter

Frans Muhren (1949) has been making art for over 40 years. After getting his degree from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, he went on to showcase his work at many exhibitions. These days, he primarily lets his work, both privately and corporately.

Frans uses a wide array of materials, like wood, iron, styrofoam, plastics, acrylic paint and oil paint. Sometimes, he’ll emphasize volume and mass. Other times, he’ll be working with lines suggesting movement.

At first glance, his work seems very diverse. As a result, he has been compared to many artists from various movement in the art world. “If I’m working on a piece and it starts to remind me of a specific movement too much, I’ll be compelled to do things differently and change directions. I strive to create original work and to avoid cliches.”

That said, his portfolio shows a significant coherence. Physical space plays a large part in all of Frans’ works – a sculpture should be interesting to look at from any angle. Paintings are three-dimensional rather than flat.

Because of the precision and craftsmanship on show, his sculptures appear to be the product of great planning and self-control. However, Frans’ methods are very much the result of intuition. “I don’t prototype or sketch beforehand. I just go to work on the materials. After a while, I enter a state where all background noise subsides. It’s at that point that something new comes into existence.”

© 2018. All images are copyrighted © by Frans Muhren. The use of any image from this site is prohibited unless prior written permission is obtained.