INBOX: George Smits. Episode 2: MAFprint experimentele zeefdrukken & affiches / Underground comics 'De verhalen van Jan' / Super 8 films 'The Colour Company Presents' / Schilderijen
Event
M HKA, Antwerpen
26 November 2015 - 03 January 2016
Episode 2
27.11.2015 – 03.01.2016
George Smits (Antwerp, 1944-1997) was a versatile musician and artist and an established name since the mid-1960s in the Antwerp underground art scene. He preferred to described himself as a beatnik.
During his studies at the Brussels Sint-Lucas Institute he joins Ferre Grignard. At that time the Antwerp music bar The Muse is the base of Ferres skiffle band. George Smits - also known as 'den Toet '- plays harmonica and guitar.
In this second episode works are displayed which Smits made under MAFprint. MAFprint stands for Mad Artist Foundation: a "one man association for the promotion of cheap art forms, art forms for a wider audience: posters, comics, actions with an experimental mobile screen printing workshop." In 1969 MAFprint moves in with ERCOLA - Experimental Research Center of Liberal Arts - which had developed into a meeting place for the Antwerp art scene in the early 1970s. The wacky alter ego of George Smits also makes an appearance in this episode in De Verhalen van Jan.
In the early 1970 George Smits gains recognition with his light installations The Colour Company and delves into the painting techniques of the Old Flemish Masters. Smits continues to paint until his death. His style and the formats of his works always keep evolving.
From 1980 onwards Smits makes dazzling fluorescent screen prints and light installations, these and all his other pictorial works have a common aim: creating a 'heavenly' experience here and now with the viewer.
