Art Brussels

Sunday 26 April
2 – 2:50 PM at the Tribune 

With Arpaïs Du Bois (artist, Gallery FIFTY ONE), Cindy Wright (artist, Belgian Gallery) and Griet Dobbels (artist, Emergent), moderated by Annick Schramme

Arpaïs Du Bois
The work of drawer-painter Arpaïs Du Bois (°1973) is strongly layered and analytic to counter the congested reality of the surrounding world. Her drawn journal-like compulsively filled books show us syntheses of images where any pretension of showing truth is excluded. Since there is no such thing as truth, as reality, everything gravitates around the perception of it. 
This is what she catches on paper, what she transforms through the adventure of the line, the playing and banging of colours. These drawing books, consisting of refined forms and scattered phrases, carefully positioned on sometimes empty grounds or sometimes painterly surfaces, have designated her public output, generally providing the content for her exhibitions in the form of pages torn from the notebooks arranged in novel constellations. These constellations have a high level of poetic strength as well as a striking fragility. Along these assembled small drawings, she explores mid-scale and large-scale drawings/paintings on paper.

 She formulates her (pre)occupation as a fight against forgetting, against oblivion. Her developed system of noting down what many overlook, of commenting so-called trivialities, by bending the bow between image and the written word has made her a fierce observer and commentator of the small systems in which we live, as well as the big wide world in which we attempt to make our small systems work.
Arpaïs Du Bois’ sharp annotations are directed towards herself as much as towards the viewer, pointing at every single one of us. Her work is about slowing down the pace of life, taking time to ask the questions that should be asked. There is a specific ‘political’ dimension to the work of Arpaïs Du Bois, what she produces is nothing more nor less than a claim, for words opposed to rationalism of our time, for thoughts which by their false authority reaffirm the properly human dimension of our lives.
Drawing is to her the continuation of thinking. She is a drawer/thinker, a thinker/writer, a writer/drawer. She is a materialiser. Her work is neither to be categorised in the anecdotal, illustrative, narrative current in contemporary drawing nor in the abstract, minimalist one. Her very own position is cogent. Even though all of her works are links of one long chain, each of them can be read and seen as an autonomous allegation. 

Griet Dobbels
Griet Dobbels is a visual artist. Her artistic career started in 1996 after graduating from The Royal College of Art in London.
Key concepts in her work are: the dialectic between grandeur and nothingness, ephemerality and timelessness, nature and culture, beauty and horror, safety and danger, chaos and control, universality and individuality. In terms of form, this content translates into various media: drawings, video installations, sculptures and happenings. Both in terms of content and form, she seeks boundaries and strives for an objectifying position. With an open attitude, she enters into very diverse collaborations. She does not shy away from shaking up expectations and uses the codes that are specific to her individual art practice for experimentation. Dobbels has exhibited at home and abroad and realized a number of notable residencies, including the most recent in Jerusalem and Ramallah (2021-2023) and Cittadellarte-Fondazione Pistoletto (2017-’18). Her work can be seen in a museum context, in arts centers, in public spaces or on the basis of various private initiatives. 

Cindy Wright
Cindy Wright (b. 1972, Herentals, Belgium), is a contemporary artist who excels in meticulous realism. Her work is characterized by ultra-detailed paintings of everyday objects such as fruit, animals and wilted flowers. Through her technique, Cindy Wright captures the fragility and ephemeral beauty of nature, creating metaphors about mortality and the passage of time, like modern-day vanitas. Her approach invites deep contemplation, revealing symbolic meanings behind seemingly banal objects. Cindy Wright’s art questions the human condition and our perception of reality. 

Annick Schramme
Prof. Dr. Annick Schramme is a senior academic and policy advisor with recognized expertise in cultural management, entrepreneurship, and governance within the cultural and creative sectors. She is Professor at the University of Antwerp (Faculty of Business and Economics), where she leads the Master’s programme in Cultural Management, and has been instrumental in developing innovative international master’s and executive education programmes in Cultural and Fashion Management.
Since 2020, Prof. Dr. Schramme has chaired the Strategic Advisory Board for Culture, Youth, Sports and Media of the Flemish Government and serves as a member of the Flemish UNESCO Commission. She previously served as President of ENCATC (2013–2017) and is frequently appointed as an expert evaluator for European projects and policy initiatives. She currently holds the UNESCO Chair in Cultural Entrepreneurship and Policy (since 2024), in collaboration with Wits University, South Africa.
Her research addresses key challenges facing the cultural and creative sectors at local, national, and international levels, with a focus on management, entrepreneurship, cultural governance, public–private partnerships, and sustainable fashion. Since 2024, she has been the lead partner of the EU Horizon project Just Fashion, and a partner in the Horizon projects Tracks4Crafts and ECHOES. Her work is characterized by a strong interdisciplinary approach, integrating business and management perspectives with social, historical, and legal insights.