Page 93 - The 60.Venice Biennial & MoMA issue of WOA Contemporary Art magazine

It is a brilliant piece, far beyond the ken of the prehistoric Menhir, Menhirs pleasure, especially the linear pleasure of the erotic curve,
for it is a Menhir with an inner space, a Menhir that remains serves transcendence. It is indeed a form of transcendence, as “I
monumental, but that has lost its mass and floats in space and opens Love thee”, 2002 suggests. The two Menhirs sway in an erotic dance,
up, eccentrically framing the invisible force that holds it together. as though preparing to link sexually. The sensuous curves of Van de
“Menhir Hoop” is a dancing sun or primitive halo, or perhaps the Bovenkamp’s sculptures are indistinguishably erotic and spiritual.
monstrance, the site of the vision, in which the eternal mystery will They strongly suggest that the core of erotic experience is spiritual,
at last become manifest to the inner eye, before disappearing back and that without the erotic the spiritual lacks the springboard it
into the blinding light. We must jump through the hoop into the needs to move beyond the mundane. Like Blake, Van de Bovenkamp
beyond, the leap of faith with no assurance that there is anything is an artist-mystic who intuitively understands that without erotic joie
to believe in, as Soren Kierkegaard said. The hoop embodies the de vivre, the lyricism of his work conveys guiltless pleasure, feminine
sacred in all its ironic mystery. One last thought; Van de Bovenkamp’s as well as phallic, the spiritual cannot come into its own scale,
Menhirs display the “lineaments of satisfied desire”, to use the material, content, and form dynamically interact with the natural
language of William Blake, an artistic-mystic if ever there was one. and architectural world that surrounds his sculptures. This vivid
It seems spiritually regressive to bring eros into the picture, but monograph includes a detailed chronology highlighted by the artist’s
Van de Bovenkamp’s Menhirs are as erotically alive as they are personal recollections, as well as illuminating essays on his creation
spiritually convincing. This is unthinkable in the prehistoric Menhir; of sacred space, monumental sculpture, and the seductive Menhir
sacred, rather than its handmaiden. In contrast, Van de Bovenkamp’s series. (Hans Van de Bovenkamp’s “Menhirs” by Donald Kuspit)

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