Ricardo Brey. Gap in the Clouds

Ricardo Brey (°1955, Havana) is one of the most important artists of our time. His artistic roots lie in the 1970s and 1980s as an active member of the group Volumen I, a landmark in Cuban art history. After extensive travel, Brey receives an invitation from Jan Hoet to participate in Documenta IX in Kassel. Brey moves to Ghent in 1990, where he still lives and works. In 1998 he received a Guggenheim fellowship for installation art and sculpture and the Flemish Visual Arts Prize. Brey has held numerous international group and solo exhibitions including in Belgium SMAK (2006) and M HKA (2015). The artist is represented by Alexander Gray Associates, New York.

Gap in the Clouds is published to accompany the solo exhibition by Ricardo Brey in Museum Hof van Busleyden in Mechelen. It is his first major exhibition in Belgium after his participation in the 56th Venice Biennale. With Gap in the clouds, the artist wants to make a positive statement and give a sign of hope in these troubled times. The globally shared humanity of the pandemic and the rousing social movements for racial and gender equality have prompted Brey to create a series of introspective works that seek to weave a web between his disparate works. Colour and light are playing an important role encompassing the artist’s ongoing exploration of concepts like time, mythology, human expression, and the natural universe. In his works of this period of solitude in his studio due to the lockdowns Brey explores the colour blue as he associated this colour with the sky and the sea, symbols of expansiveness and freedom, with open spaces, intuition, imagination, inspiration, and sensitivity. The book will include artist writings and a collaboration with author and poet Peter Verhelst.