Het Kabinet van de Conservator // The Studio of the Artist

Johan Van Geluwe (Waregem, 1929-2020) was an artist and architect whose work is not easy to categorize. He founded fictional institutions, such as ‘The Museum of Museums’, of which he was curator, he built installations, created collections and published graphic work. In 2012 he decided to donate his entire collection ‘The Museum of Museums’ to the Waregem City Archives. The transfer to the City Archives took place in phases and has recently been fully completed. In the context of the reopening of the archive, visual artist Hans Demeulenaere (°Ostend, 1974, lives and works in Bruges) was asked to enter into a dialogue with the objects of the collection and the ideas of Johan Van Geluwe with an artistic intervention. Hans Demeulenaere is inspired by architecture, space and design. In his artistic practice he appropriates existing objects and gives them a surprising translation. In this exhibition (at Henri Lebbestraat 25, Waregem), Hans Demeulenaere chooses the specific arrangement of ‘The Cabinet of the Conservator’ that was on display in 2009 in the 2009 exhibition Johan Van Geluwe: The Museum of Museums in Be-Part Waregem. Hans Demeulenaere presents this installation in dialogue with his own work ‘The Studio of the Artist’. In this way he creates, as it were, a mirror and a reflection of both practices on each other.