In the 80s, Malfliet was a student at the Antwerp fashion academy under the mentorship of Walter Van Beirendonck before he resolutely opted for painting in 1988-89. 15 years later, he obtained his second master's degree in painting under Fred Bervoets.
In the work of Christophe Malfliet, 'figurative and abstract' stand side by side. The work of Christophe Malfliet escapes the categories, labels and formulas that are all too common in the contemporary art world. Malfliet's oeuvre is after all systemless and extraordinary, which requires an unconventional vocabulary. He brings stories to life on the canvas with an idiosyncratic palette and a semiotic layering. Figures and shapes try to overlap each other, by working with transparent colour fields under and above the figuration. A versatile artist who never stops to question and reinvent himself and his art. Malfliet is a master at painting the selvedge over the edge. Sometimes subtly, almost at walking pace, he crosses the line and then again completely oversteps it.
Malfliet's works are invariably recognisable because of the style, the confused colour combinations and the outlined forms, but also because, no matter how innocent the scene may appear, he succeeds in infusing his paintings with a rebellious undertone, a kind of self-acquired freedom in which he leaves every room for imperfection and coincidence.
Malfliet likes to work in series, around specific themes that are suggested to him by chance.
Even when he consciously chooses to make abstract works, they unmistakably bear this signature. What at first glance seems to have sprung from a spontaneous act, uncontrolled, purposeless, turns out in the end to be the result of a very conscious process, which nevertheless leaves room for the paint to take its own course. Both painter and paint seem to enjoy a fundamental freedom, without getting in each other's way, in perfect harmony. Like a matter of course.
Freedom. Sometimes you have to fight for it, sometimes it comes naturally...