Us Open

"Ashe, his feet apart, his knees slightly bent, lifts a tennis ball into the air. The toss is high and forward. […] His feet draw together. His body straightens and tilts forward far beyond the point of balance. He is falling. The force of gravity and muscular momentum from legs to arm compound as he whips his racquet up and over the ball. He weighs a hundred and fiftyfive pounds; he is six feet tall, and right-handed. His build is barely full enough not to be describable as frail, but his coordination is so extraordinary that the ball comes off his racquet at furious speed. With a step forward that stops his fall, he moves to follow." John McPhee, Levels of the Game, 1969 Moving between sculpture and installation, Maarten Van Roy’s (b. 1985, Bonheiden, Belgium) artistic practice is characterized by an intimate dialogue with matter, exploring how the principles of chaos theory - unpredictability, entropy, transformation - can enrich our view of the reality that surrounds us. In his exhibitions, his sculptures - constructed from found, often broken and/or weathered objects, or handmade using traditional techniques - transcend their multiformity and put us in touch with the here and now. The interaction of the objects with the space, to which the viewer becomes a part, is crucial in this. A tight, dynamic whole, rich in substantive connections and injuries from previous encounters, takes one in and reflects our individual strength and vulnerability. For his exhibition at Cc Strombeek, Van Roy transforms the space into a contemplative environment, a place where decay and renewal converge. By focusing on the life cycles of materials, he explores how matter itself can act as a storyteller. A particularly poignant part of the exhibition includes the use of broken chocolate figures, which Van Roy reconstructed into new forms during a residency in Milan and subsequently fixed in bronze like sculptural Polaroids. A casting test had revealed that the chocolate in the ceramic mold does not fully burn away, causing glitches and carbonization in the bronze cast. Having exploited this phenomenon, the result is a series of unique sculptures, merging sculptural ambition with thermodynamics and popular culture. This rearrangement, which sublimates his scientificartistic research project Les Quatre Guides du Chaos, touches on the symbolism of Easter and unites universal themes of hope, cosmic renewal and the endless cycles of life and death. The equal aesthetic potential of growth and degeneration is underlined, linking physical transformation to broader existential and social reflections.