Cynthia van de Loo is a Canterbury based professional artist and freelance photographer. Being creative has been a life long passion of Cynthia’s. She uses creativity as a revealing process, for her it is an inner experience where she can explore the true self. Exploration of the outer world has also given understanding of the interconnectedness of All that is. She started creating contemporart fine art by releasing the feelings in her subconscious, which has allowed her to experience creating the human form on a mental, physicaal and spiritual level, both in abstract and realistic genres.

There have been uses of many diverse mediums on different surfaces in previous art works; from oils & acrylic to metal & volcanic rock. They have all been a wonderful bases for her new art works. The latest art works are exploring a mix or 2D and 3D sculptures/wall mountings. They encompass mediums such as Kiln Cast Glass, Aluminium, Acrylic Plastic's, Steel, metal powders and photographic transfers. Extremely inspired with these mediums, Cynthia is delving into a whole new area of her being.

 

REVIEW : for Cynthia van de Loo from Neil Roberts

Early last century Carl Jung the famous Swiss theorist revealed something about the transcendant and transformative power of art and how it enables the engagement of the unconscious to allow expression of the unknown to come into the light of consciousness. Jung postulated that a polarity exists between our inner and outer worlds. He envisioned that even though there is a barrier between what we term the conscious and unconscious states of mind these can be transcended by art imagery. In other words images give the unconscious a voice, and in this way through the medium of art there is a potential to unite three different worlds at once; the conscious, unsconious and the world of concrete reality. By making the unknown conscious and real, an integration of inner and outer existence can occur.

So how is this relevant to the work of Cynthia van de Loo. It is relevant in that van de Loo has not only a purpose in her work to reveal the unseen and sensed but alos to use her art as a medium to externalise those forces and to underscore the fact that there are states both conscious and subsconscious that are interconnected and fundamental to life existence on both spiritual and temporal planes.

In a way van de Loo is in a unique situation by the very fact that until recently she was a professional photographer and has developed a strong and practiced sense about the concrete reality of the outer world. It is only by having a firm awareness and understanding of this that any astist can attempt to successfully engage with the more abstract dimension of inner being.

On her journey and quest to reveal life forces van de Loo has deliberately explored a diverse range of media that varies from the use of the more conventional, such as oil and acrylic paints, to the less orthodox, such as metals and cats glass. Each has provided a different result, but just the media causality in itself has never been a prime objective for van de Loo. The use of different materials and their manipulation is essential for this artist to achieve a holistic vision in her work. The materials she uses are all elements of the earth and part of what she wants to convey about the integration and the potency of the continuum of natural forces. Whilst several contemporrrary New Zealand artists work in a plethora of different media few have developed the scope and abilities to master mediums so assiduously as has van de Loo.

When mediums are deliberately chosen to fulfill the expression that an artist wants to achieve they have to be rendered in accord with the shape and colour essentials that are demanded in a pictorial composition. For van de Loo this intent also seems important, but in addition so are the textural qualities of surface and the absorptive or reflective power of light on these, and this aspect is no more visible than in the work "Unfolding"(2008) a painting in which van de Loo has combined both natural and synthetic material. This relief work whic makes a strong statement about the unfolding of human life through the three stages is conceived like a large multifaceted jewel of life, and such a metaphor is not inapt as the work commands intimate attention and its precise form and construction particularly with the use of three plexiform domes and two fronds that emanate from a shield like source reinforces that jewel -like allusion.

The execution of "Unfolding" also reveals much about the ability of van de Loo as an artist to effectively work whatever material she is using. Her treatment is meticulous and the time involved in bring into being such a work as this is almost impossible to assess. It also highlights the fact that deliberate investment of meaningful symbolism brings a special aspect to her work as a perceived abstraction. The question therefore needs to be put as to how abstract is van de Loo's work?

The whole notion of abstraction, in which artists manipulate the visual aspects of a real subject, and seperate of withdraw something from something else has been a major development in modern art. However there are many degrees of abstraction in painting. Some artists make small changes in the look of their subject matter by simplifying or exaggerating colour or shapes whilst others make more radical nonobjective departures to resolve their ideas.

In vand de Loo's activity as an artist the range of abstraction is broad and extends from works such as the rhythmical figurative "Insight"series or "Roar of Silence" where the subject has some very clear recognisable features to others that are more elemental, such as the related "Communiue" and "Space between the Thoughts" series. The latter works that were developed in response to the artist's experience of meditation do not pretend to represent anything other than and expression of the diminution of energy from the bodily source of thought until there is just stillness, and being merges with space and nothingness. In such works the elements of the painting whether it be a strainght line of tension or a splatter os paint to indicate fragmentation presents a powerful vehicle for the artist to communicate directly, albeit abstractly with the viewer.

With a world plunged into a morass of contradictions and materialistic absurdity that is diverting for many contempory artists, it is refreshing that Cynthia van de Loo is one who displays commitment to keep burning the conscious and unconscious light of being.

Neil Roberts is the director and principal art valuer of Independent Art Valuations Ltd (Christchurch) and has more than 25 years experience in appraising art.

Formerly a traind artist, teacher and senior curator at the Robert McDougall and Christchurch Art Galleries (1979 - 2006) Neil Roberts specialist area of expertise is historical and contemporary New Zealand art which he has researched, written about, lectured on and reviewed over many years.

Early last century Carl Jung the famous Swiss theorist revealed something about the transcendant and transformative power of art and how it enables the engagement of the unconscious to allow expression of the unknown to come into the light of consciousness.
Jung postulated that a polarity exists between our inner and outer worlds. He envisioned that even though there is a barrier between what we term the conscious and unconscious states of mind these can be transcended by art imagery. In other words images give the unconscious a voice, and in this way through the medium of art there is a potential to unite three different worlds at once; the conscious, unconscious and the world of concrete reality. By making the unknown conscious and real, an integration of inner and outer existence can occur.
So how is this relevant to the work of Cynthia van de Loo. It is relevant in that van de Loo has not only a purpose in her work to reveal the unseen and sensed but also to use her art as a medium to externalise those forces, and to underscore the fact that there are states both conscious and subconscious that are interconnected and fundamental to life existence on both spiritual and temporal planes.
In a way van de Loo is in a unique situation by the very fact that until recently she was a professional photographer and has developed a strong and practiced sense about the concrete reality of the outer world. It is only by having a firm awareness and understanding of this that any artist can attempt to successfully engage with the more abstract dimension of inner being.
On her journey and quest to reveal life forces van de Loo has deliberately explored a diverse range of media that varies from the use of the more conventional, such as oil and acrylic paints, to the less orthodox, such as metals and cast glass. Each has provided a different result, but just media causality in itself has never been a prime objective for van de Loo . The use of different materials and their manipulation is essential for this artist to achieve a holistic vision in her work. The materials she uses are all elements of the earth and part of what she wants to convey about the integration and the potency of the continuum of natural forces.
Whilst several contemporary New Zealand artists work in a plethora of different media few have developed the scope and abilities to master those mediums so assiduously as has van de Loo.
When mediums are deliberately chosen to fulfill the expression that an artist wants to achieve they have to be rendered in accord with the shape and colour essentials that are demanded in a pictorial composition.
For van de Loo this intent also seems important, but in addition so are the textural qualities of surface and the absorptive or reflective power of light on these, and this aspect is no more visible than in the work Unfolding (2008) a painting in which van de Loo has combined both natural and synthetic materials. This relief work which makes a strong statement about the unfolding of human life through three stages is conceived like a large multifaceted jewel of life, and such a metaphor is not inapt as the work commands intimate attention and its precise form and construction particularly with the use of three plexiform domes and two fronds that emanate from a shield like source reinforces that jewel- like allusion.
The execution of Unfolding also reveals much about the ability of van de Loo as an artist to effectively work whatever material she is using. Her treatment is meticulous and the time involved in bringing into being such a work as this is almost impossible to assess. It also highlights the fact that deliberate investment of meaningful symbolism brings a special aspect to her work as a perceived abstraction. The question therefore needs to be put as to how abstract is van de Loo's work ?