06 june 2025, Indra Devriendt
Trust your senses: Nel Bonte in Eva Steynen Gallery
With 'Tamed Animals', Nel Bonte is presenting her first solo exhibition at Eva Steynen Gallery, showcasing a diversity of forms, materials and textures. Something resonates with me with some of her work, a sense of recognition or understanding. But just when I think I know what it's about, it slips away again because her work is impossible to fully grasp.
Her sculptures are placed either within the space or on the wall. She is also showing a number of watercolours. It’s an eclectic mix. Everyday objects, shapes and architectural elements serve as her sources of inspiration. Bonte is often on the move because, as she puts it, “I see an element or a word that inspires me.” She has an eye for detail. When she spots an interesting shape, she immediately creates a mould of it. “I collect the moulds in my studio, where I combine them into assemblages and decide which material or colour I’ll use to cast them.”
Nel Bonte Pongo, 2025, Eva Steynen Gallery
Organic and geometric shapes alternate or merge. For one series of sculptures, she started with fuse beads. “I melted the beads with a heat gun. The chemical reaction transformed the geometric pattern into an organic shape.”
The result is amorphous forms full of movement. “Several works in this exhibition are inspired by children's toys, such as tangram puzzle pieces.” They serve as building blocks. “I enjoy puzzling with pieces and searching for interesting proportions. Toys provide a base for me to reshape things. I find it fascinating to take a simple object out of context and give it a new existence.”
Other work is based on architectural elements. She draws what she observes, abstracts it and then translates it into sculptures. This in turn inspires her to create watercolours. One work feeds the next. She varies and builds, exploring shape, material, colour and texture. Her work is interconnected, which is also reflected in the way everything is presented. Positive and negative spaces are a constant, creating a tension between presence and absence, defined and undefined.
Tamed animals, Eva Steynen Gallery
Bonte enjoys exploring possibilities. She embraces mistakes and coincidences that arise during the process. “Sometimes, a certain temperature or material causes an unexpected reaction. In my mind, this adds value to a sculpture or opens up possibilities for new work.”
She also likes to work in series and experiment with scale. “I usually don’t choose a realistic scale, but rather a reduction or enlargement. I prefer big and monumental.” This translates into the range of artworks she has already created for public spaces.
Bonte makes multiple versions and experiments with various materials and textures. This sometimes results in pronounced sculptures on a pedestal. Elsewhere, the sculptures have legs or stand on trestles. Some pieces resemble scale models or maquettes. There are sculptures with glossy and matte glazes, some meticulously finished, others still showing traces of fingers, spatulas or looking weathered. Her work cannot be pigeonholed. When is something a sculpture and when is it considered finished?
Nel Bonte Stek, 2024, Eva Steynen Gallery
The work presented is mostly black and white with a few colour accents like pink and green. Colour often serves as a reference. Bonte tends to choose insignificant colours that disorient rather than convey meaning. As humans, we love to seek recognition, name things and find explanations. We crave clarity and certainty. Bonte explores this. Her work reminds us of things from our collective memory. It defies categorisation and escapes unambiguous meanings. Bonte doesn’t present ready-made images, but activates the viewer. What we see is open to interpretation. That elusiveness keeps her work fresh and dynamic. It invites repeated engagement. Apart from its physical presence, Bonte’s work opens up a mental space. Her work is not a final product, but an invitation to participate in a process, to trust your senses. Bonte also stimulates our imagination, giving us the opportunity to explore, to interpret her work and to make connections.
