Frans Van Roosmaelen
Living greedily, painting generously
‘Knallen’ (to let it rip) is an expression Frans Van Roosmaelen liked. In his paintings he allowed colours and strokes to rip with outright joy, in his life he went looking eagerly for extreme experiences. To his inner circle he would admit that he needed to be charged, certainly sexually, to be able to paint. Absence of such tension had repercussions for his art. Greedily he would explore the bleak realms of life which generously bore witness in his drawings, paintings and collages.

Frans Van Roosmaelen needed the high to be creative. What he sucked from life he gave back in restless generous works of art, charged with ecstasy and violence, primal urges, but also great myths of life and death.

Frank Heirman