Hans Kitslaar

Hans Kitslaar – °1944 – Roermond – The Netherlands

Hans Kitslaar received his training at the Maastricht Art Academy and completed his education at the National Superior Institute for the Arts in Antwerp, where Rik Slabbinck was his teacher and mentor. Already in his early twenties he received important awards for his work.

Through his 50 year career, he evolved from neo-expressionist, over an ardent adept of the claire-obscure, into a remarkable unity of style which is free of any –ism : a painter of light, but most of all ... Hans Kitslaar. His individual style became a recognizable signature in the world of contemporary painting.

Kitslaar finds intensive happiness in the concentration he finds every time in his painting. He continues to paint the light that gives life and growth to the fauna and flora of this and of his world. He depicts and paints his own perception of this miracle that mirrors and reflects in his studio and he transports it onto the canvas with light brushes and tender touches. His colour pallet always changes. According to the light, his mood and his virtuosity, the colour scheme changes from lighter to darker, from deeper to more transparent.

The oeuvre of Hans Kitslaar bears witness to his spontaneity and his mature composition skill and insight. Every painting gives shape to his emotions and is unique in the way it transforms these into colour and light. The colour scheme, the chosen theme, the luminosity and the incidence of the light of every work will allow to the onlooker to discover the emotions of the artist behind every stroke and touch of the paint brush.

Hans Kitslaar always seems to breathe calmness and serenity, but inside he is continually driven by a restless search for the highest and the most sincere. And although this search seems endless, it is his driving force in life and the secret of his never fading inventivity and subtle creative identity.