Contemporary Belgian artist Michaël Borremans' only U.S. solo museum exhibition ran at the Cleveland Museum of Art in 2005. Titled Hallucination and Reality, it focused on his small paintings and sketches on cardboard. His only solo U.S. gallery show was at New York's David Zwirner in 2009 and featured a collection of his slow-moving filmwork.
But the DMA has just announced something exciting. A comprehensive survey of the artist's career -- bringing together paintings, drawings and films produced over the last 20 years -- is coming. And it will first greet American audiences right here, in Dallas, in 2015.
Co-organized by the DMA and Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels (BOZAR) and curated by the DMA's Jeffrey Grove (who you could correctly say has written the book on the guy), this show is titled Michaël Borremans: As sweet as it gets, and it looks amazing.
Borremans creates captivating subjects who often appear in peril -- the causes of their doomed states are difficult to pinpoint. In the same way Lucian Freud's protagonists project claustrophobia, Borremans' emit treachery. Plots build around them, alluding to tensions locked in the wings. Even his color palettes are ominous. Strangely, there's levity too. An implied dark joke with a buried punchline.
The exhibition will be on view at the DMA from March 15 through July 5, 2015, and will consist of goods pulled from private and public collections from Europe and the United States. In addition to approximately 50 paintings and 45 drawings, you'll also see five of the artist's films, including The Storm, 2006. (Read a great interview with Borremans on his film work here.)
Dallas is the third stop for As sweet as it gets. The exhibition will open in February 2014 at BOZAR in Brussels, and then travel to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art in Jerusalem in September 2014 before arriving in Dallas in March of 2015. Other U.S. dates have not been announced.
