Added Jul 8, 2005
Middle-aged men pine for their lost youth in Andre van der Kerkhoff’s latest exhibition
When young Andre van der Kerkhoff was growing up in rural Austria, art wasn’t something he was encouraged to do. In fact, the opposite was true. His father, an engineer, wasn’t happy with his drawing and daubing, but the young Andre persevered.
He travelled to India as a young man then returned to work in set design, continuing his artistic endeavours. He migrated to Australia in 1986 but it wasn’t until 1994 that he dedicated his life to art. Andre van der Kerkhoff now exhibits regularly and his exhibition ‘When Youth Become Memory’ is now showing at Michel Sourgnes Fine Arts in Ascot.
After a small chat, we browse through some of the 31 works in the show, including stark, often draftsman-like-cityscapes with erotically charged images of alluring young women often being ogled by older men.
Not exactly politically correct, but there you have it. Mind you, Andre has a penchant for controversy. In an exhibition at Michel Sourgnes last year, he explored the global order since 11 September on canvasses emblazoned with the Star of David, Swastikas and Crosses in an Iconoclastic Survey of where the world was then, and maybe is even now.
This time around he’s exploring the same territory as Nabokov in his controversial novel Lolita, later an equally controversial film in two screen versions. There are direct references to Lolita business in some of the works, most particularly one that uses the name in the title, ‘ When Loloita Cancels Out Reason.’
You’ll recall in Nabokov’s book an older man becomes obsessed with a young teenage girl. Despite the arty and psychological pretensions of the story, it dealt, basically, with pedophilia. It must be pointed out that this is not what this exhibition is about. ( The artist did, however, deal with this subject in his last show.)
What he’s more concerned with here is the idea of ‘ Male Menopause.’
“ There is also this idea of sadness that youth will never come again,” says the 47-year-old artist.
The figures, often lone and seemingly alienated, linger on railway platforms, on empty streets and in apartment windows, longing for their past. The erotic femmes featured, occasionally streetwalkers dressed for the part, symbolise the lost potency of youth. The middle-aged men equate youth with sexual potency and sexual conquest, it seems.
The scenery, not surprisingly, is distinctly European for obvious reasons. The titles help viewers tune in to the artist’s wavelength. Titles such as ‘ When Eroticism becomes just another Burden, When Age feels like a Crime you haven’t committed, When Fantasy is as tired as your wicked bones ‘ evoke ... convey the message.
Some might feel uncomfortable with the images evoked by the artist. Not that their inherent eroticism is at all pornographic. It’s just that the idea of the older man dreaming of, and occasionally lusting after, the younger woman is probably not socially acceptable.
Any discomfort on that score is probably contrived, though, and exactly what the artist is seeking to evoke. “ I’m not trying to be controversial, though,” he says, with a twinkle in his eye, “ I am, however, trying to get people to debate ideas such as this.”