THE DESERT HEAT

The Belgian artist Isabelle Scheltjens´ work can best be described as a defined mixture of an original and a contemporary language. Her portraits, where thousands of pieces of unique glass mosaics in specific patterns form a precise image, are striking to the eye in their technical and visual language. The artist´s time-consuming and laborious technique, where layers of coloured glass is placed in structured manner links to both Pointillism and bright Op Art.

The work´s intricate and captivating details and the artist´s play with colors, light and shadow asks the viewer to engage themselves. When viewed at a distance, our eyes fuse the individual pieces of glass into one solid singular portrait.

Through the technique contrasting properties is united – resisting and fragile, transparent and opaque, light and heavy. Although Isabelle’s modern-day glass pointillism requires technical craftsmanship, technique is merely a means to an end. The seemingly random forms and colours on the surface of the canvas come together to form a distinct, expressive, tactile image – pointillism reinvented and re-contextualized.

Isabelle Scheltjens is born in Antwerp, Belgium in 1981. Early on she developed a passion for art. She was formally trained at the Antwerp City Institute for Decorative Arts and Crafts before she married talented glasswork artist Dirk Neefs who opened her eyes to the craft of using and manipulating coloured glass as a means for artistic expression.