CÉCILE VAN HANJA

Frozen Light

2023

“Frozen Light” captures a captivating scene where a white modernistic architectural marvel rests amid a landscape draped in glistening snow, set against a dramatic backdrop of a dark...

Born in Corsica, Cecile van Hanja spent her childhood in France before moving to the Netherlands as a child. Inspired by Piet Mondrian, the De Stijl movement, as well as her newfound home in the Netherlands, van Hanja found her calling. By focusing on straight lines and the patterns found in architecture, van Hanja became interested in finding order in a time of chaos. Van Hanja creates a rhythmical pattern of vertical and horizontal lines in her observation of architecture. A multi-colored labyrinth of overlapping planes are created in order to emphasize the immaterial aspect of a building. In juggling the ideas of irrationality and intuition, van Hanja is able to build depth in her works by layering thin layers of acrylic and oil paint. The multiple layers result in the underlying colors to be visible, and allows the architectural composition to not be static. Van Hanja wishes to give space to the individual through unique and handmade work. In her paintings, she perceives the houses and buildings as metaphors for the state of mind. The absence of human presence, a quiet stillness, and an interest in light allows for a story to form. The clear walls and floors with reflections on the opposite walls don’t give any footing and the perspective lines and vanishing points, like rational benchmarks lead to an irrational and intuitive way of thinking. Cecile van Hanja graduated from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam in 1993. She is currently based in Haarlem, the Netherlands, and her work is included in private collections in France, Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Japan, and the United States. architecture, interior design, decoration, blue, linear, reflection, white, minimalism, cube, house, pool...

This painting conveys a sense of calmness that reigns in the winter landscape, when everything freezes in anticipation of a new day. Deep cold shades of blue and gray create an atmos...

"Shades of Silence" embodies a moment of peace, when nature freezes in anticipation of sunset. The canvas depicts mountain slopes illuminated by the evening light, which scatters amo...