In a digital realm defined by tension, Maarten Bloemen (@flowersindutch), based in Oudsbergen, Belgium, composes figures and landscapes that pulse with collision. Kuro Shiro begins from the simplest of gestures—the hand-drawn stripe—yet it unfolds into a world where black and white become language, red becomes signal, and pattern becomes presence. Figures emerge as guardians cloaked in geometry, landscapes fracture into striped monuments, and rivers bleed with interference. Rather than seeking harmony, the series dwells in disruption, finding poetry in opposition, meaning in clash. Bloemen treats duality not as division but as catalyst, where silence becomes signal, tradition becomes futurism, and order becomes collision. His works appear both ancient and futuristic, ceremonial and coded, reminding us that identity is shaped not by stability but by flux.
“I don’t search for balance I dwell in collision where opposition becomes possibility.”
Maarten Bloemen | @flowersindutch
Stripe, Guardian, and Landscape: Pattern as Presence
In “The Dyad,” two figures stand inscribed by black-and-white geometries, their bodies marked as if by ritual or warning. Faces partially veiled, eyes steady, they embody guardianship not through armor but through code. Their stripes carry language, both protective and declarative, transforming fashion into sign. In “Signal Bearer,” geometry sharpens into icon: a helmet striped in stark contrasts, a gaze like static breaking through silence. The figure appears less person than vessel, presence defined by inscription rather than flesh. In “Striped Landscapes,” cliffs and valleys fracture into linear monuments, black and white carved across stone, rivers glowing with sudden veins of red. The terrain is no longer natural but rewritten, geology turned into message, interference shaping earth itself.
Each of these works demonstrates Bloemen’s refusal of resolution. Figures are not portraits but systems, landscapes are not environments but inscriptions. Kuro and Shiro—black and white—are not opposites but partners in perpetual dialogue.
Maarten Bloemen | @flowersindutch
Maarten Bloemen – Pattern as Language, Collision as Form
Bloemen’s practice reflects his dual foundations: a fascination with tradition and a commitment to futurism. He generates forms with AI platforms like MidJourney and Krea, then refines them by hand until digital generation merges with human tactility. His methodology itself mirrors his theme: collision between machine and maker, system and hand. By lingering in contrast rather than smoothing it, Bloemen transforms conflict into beauty.
Kuro Shiro crystallizes this vision. It is less series than system, a grammar of stripes that becomes guardian, vessel, and monument. The works remind us that meaning is not born in harmony but in encounter, not in balance but in flux. Bloemen crafts a world where geometry is not neutral but charged, where pattern speaks in ritual tones, and where figures become signs of transformation. His art insists that tension is not a problem to be solved but a state to be inhabited—a dialogue unending, a language still writing itself across skin and stone.
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