Jan-Hein Arens (born on September 23, 1974 in Vught, the Netherlands) is a painter, sculptor and illustrator. He studied graphic design and illustration at the Grafische School Eindhoven from 1992 until 1996.
The art of Arens concentrates on basic human needs and emotions. By adding different, strange elements, often painted in a realistic way, or placing them out of context the spectator is forced to make up his/her own reason or meaning for the work.
Humour and alienation are essential elements in Arens’ work. Small scribbles of text written directly on the canvas with pen and ink complete the image or just ad confusion.
From May 20, 2023 until June 11 the work of Jan-Hein Arens will be on display in a solo exhibition at Morton Contemporary Gallery in Philadelphia, USA. The exhibition will contain ten new paintings, three new sculptures and drawings. It is the first solo show of Arens in Philadelphia.
For youth center Elzenburg Arens made an eight by four meter mural. The mural contains several drawings that were made with the users of the building in mind. Arens gave three workshops where users of the building learned to work in his style and were asked to make a drawing about what they loved about the centre, or what they were missing. These drawings were used as inspiration to design the themes of the mural.
In order to have maximum control of the end result the mural was composed digitally. The drawings and realistic painted elements were all painted on small pieces of paper and photographed in high resolution to keep the black lines as sharp as possible. Then they were digitally put together on a separate painted background. The complete mural was printed on laminated foil and mounted on the wall by an external company.
‘He Who Carries The Weight Of The World’ is a 3d resin printed sculpture that was the result of a period of experimenting with 3d printing. It is printed in a limited edition of 20. It is hand painted with acrylics and ink and finished with varnish. because each sculpture is hand painted, variations occur that make each sculpture unique.
Title: He Who Carries The Weight Of The World
Size: 24/19/13 cm (excluding pedestal)
3D resin print, hand painted with acrylics and ink with a varnish finish on an alabaster pedestal.
For a cultural event Arens made an installation with the title Soft on the Outside, Art on the Inside. The installation contains a dome with in it a single person exhibition of an animated drawing.
Project Alienation (or Alien Nation) is an art project by Jan-Hein Arens. It consists of eight animations with alienation as an overlapping theme. During the corona pandemic people got used to keep their distance from one another. The longer the pandemic lasted, the more estranged people became; they alienated from the basic things that make us humans. This inspired Arens to make these animations. The project can be found here: Project Alienation (or Aliennation).
The animations are made to be moving drawings; they are not intended to tell a story where time is involved or where a plot presents itself at the end of the film. Just drawings. Except they move every now and then.
This project was made possible by Kunstloc Brabant. Arens received a grant; the ‘Perspectiefbudget’ to work on this project for quite some time.
As part of the art project ‘Schatten van Zonneheuvel’ Arens was asked to develop an artwork for people with limited vision. Together with people from of a residency where elderly with a visual disability live he developed an app that could be enjoyed without sight. The app is called ‘Loftrompet Deluxe’ (it is in Dutcht only) and it functions as a compliments generator. With the press of a button a random compliment is generated for the user. It even contains the option to make the compliments rhetorical. For the people at the residency the app is installed on a tablet with a custom made external big red button, which can be found on touch.
The app can be found in Google Play and can be installed on most modern Android devices. For now it is only available in Dutch but there are some vague plans to develop an English version.
There are currently no plans to release a version for iOS, but you’ll never know.
Morton Contemporary will be present at the Hamptons Fine Art Fair (July 14 / 17, Southampton Fairgrounds, New York) with a selection of their artists. One of these artists is Jan-Hein Arens. He created a new collection of four 40/40 inch paintings that will be shown at the fair.
Tickets to the fair are available now at hamptonsfineartfair.com
Featured Morton Contemporary artist: Adam Handler, Nathan Paddison, Jan Hein Arens, Sniqus and Esther Ziher-Ginczinger
Arens was asked to make a work for a neighbourhood. This was part of a bigger project; Schatten van Zonneheuvel, with artists Carola Mokveld and Angelique Kleijne. The residents were all quite different; some elderly, some foreigners, some gay people, some young people etc etc. They have all lived together problem free since the start, and continue to be a close community where anybody can be themselves and just gets accepted for who they are. A rough translation of the text on the drawing: “…and as it turned out to be, in exactly the same way we are all completely different”Ink and acrylics on paper, photographed and printed on acrylic glass, 20/20 cm.
For this project a total of six artworks will be installed over the course of three months. On August 27 the second artwork by Arens will be revealed.
Morton Contemporary Gallery in Philadelphia (USA) now has six new large scale paintings in stock. These paintings were painted from January to March 2022 specifically for the gallery.
If you would like to know more about the paintings or the gallery, visit their website.
From 14 till 17 October 2021 the Affordable Art Fair Stockholm will take place in, you guessed it, Stockholm, Sweden. Carré d’Artistes Amsterdam will be there with a selection of their artists, including the work of Jan-Hein Arens.
The 9th edition of Affordable Art Fair Stockholm showcases 1000s of contemporary artworks from 40 hand-picked local and international galleries. Whether you’re a seasoned collector, or looking for your first limited-edition print, the fair is the perfect place to learn more about art and refine your taste. So, mark your diary and prepare to discover new and exciting art from around the world!
You can find more information on their website.