These last few years Sjaak van Rhijn, monumental sculptor, has chosen to work with slate. Previously he had worked with ceramics, basalt, granite and marble. His present preference for slate is already discernible in his previous work. His method of working has always emphasized the juxtaposition of non structured natural surfaces, besides refined surfaces often polished purposefully by the artist.

His first works in ceramics gave the impression that the different parts had separated, were cut off from what was initially a whole. Stone having this appearance naturally became thus the central material in the work of Van Rhijn. In his smaller slate sculptures, a great poetry flows from the contrast between the natural stratification and the refined forms that we see like rising up from the mineral. It suggests architectural constructions, sources of light and heat, transmitters and receivers. Furthermore, slate has its own history: from times immemorial man has written or engraved on it, using the material either flat or “en volume”.

These two ways of using it have influenced the work of Van Rhijn. The regular structure of a series of small plates of slate is the starting point for some larger pieces, with as main theme the reception of reflective light. When moving around a monumental translucent curtain of lamina of slate set up at different angles, continuously changing motifs appear. At times we see the material like vanish in the almost blinding clarity of the light which illuminates it. The act of scratching, filling up grooves with graphite or polishing the surface reveals signs, movement and motifs, in shades of light grey to deep black. Each piece of slate is like a sheet of paper in a kind of sketch book, telling the story of the marks made by different writing tools, and on other moments revealing the very diversity of slate as a material.

Hans Vogels, 1994