André is a painter who has surrendered to abstraction in a rather idiosyncratic way. At first sight his paintings seem smudged and inarticulate, yet appear clear and sharp on second view. They are the result of different treatments of the same material, first in his studio and later elsewhere. In his studio he often submits the unstretched canvas to rough physical treatment, which involves the usual basic elements of painting: the canvas, the primer and the paint.
Examples of actions outside the studio can vary from the treated canvases being dragged around by a group of children frolicking in the woods, to hemming them together with his mother at the kitchen table. Through these combinations of activities inside and outside the studio, André extends what is traditionally considered as “painting”, by bringing the painting and his painting practice into the realm of an intimate social context.