Biography
Jo Vandeleene, visual artist,
born and residing in Kortrijk-Heule on 8 October 1961.
trained as a textile chemist and started his art education in 2001 at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Kortrijk. Started with ceramics, followed by drawing, painting and photography.
Full-time visual artist since 2019.
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As a visual artist, he went a long way from letting go and at the same time a never-ending, restless search for images that give him satisfaction.
He grew up in the then rural Heule, between the fields and the numerous farms. As a child he already had an innate sensitivity to the rhythm of nature and the light around him. The observations he made of his surroundings were instinctively reflected in the clay figurines he made, his drawings and painting works. At school, sometimes to the annoyance of the teachers, his notebooks and courses were full of sketches and drawings.
A little later, the fascination for photography came and at the age of 15 he bought his first analogue camera. As a self-taught artist he photographed a lot, but with the idea that photography was only documentary, he quickly lost interest in this medium. The artistic potential that photography has did not come to his mind at that time.
Professionally, he became active as a chemist in textile finishing, specializing in dyeing textiles. In 1993 he started his wholesale business in chemicals and dyes for the textile industry, until he decided to sell the business in 2019.
In the meantime, he had started his ceramics training at the KASK in Kortrijk in 2001 and came into contact with draughtsmen, painters and photographers. He felt like a fish in water. Here his passion for the visual arts grew.
After permission from the teachers, he was able to join the drawing department as a "free" student in addition to his ceramics training. Here he learned to work with charcoal, pastel, bister, aquarelle, ... etc.
He did not miss a single lesson and imposed a very intensive program on himself, which was supplemented with living model drawing in the free studio. After 6 intensive years and under the influence of his teacher, he starts studying painting. During this academic training he discovered great artistic potential of digital photography.
Since 2019 he has been working full-time and passionately with making "images".
His paintings are meticulously prepared and testify to a strong sense of perception and great technical skills. His photographs are rather abstract and impressionistic.
The variety in the choice of his themes ensures a balance in his oeuvre.