Extract

"My work is in collage, sculpture, drawings, videos and installations. It investigates the tension between planning and happenstance; the semblance of order undone by schematic chaos. Mankind is driven by an unshakeable faith in progress, where modern technology and constant growth leads us to a better world. My work explores a different outcome, where the automated forces unleashed develop structures and minds of their own.

This fascination formed in the eighties, when the urban street became my canvas as I started writing graffiti under the alias of 'Delta.' As such I became revered worldwide among my peers for my three dimensional lettering. I grew from experiences to look at and deal with the streets to a more reflective kind of work. I always treated the two dimensional frame of the letter and the word as sculpture, bursting out or morphing into the wall, piercing its boundaries by adding a dimension.

The spray can medium has long since shifted towards objects on the wall, which now even literally annex the walls. If there is a recurrent theme in my body of work made over a thirty-year span, it is walls, and how to transcend their boundaries. It might breath the ghost of the old utopists and constructivists, but of a time where the rotting process of the concrete is clearly visible.

My collages read as isometric industrial landscapes. By layering, cutting and chiseling I search for change in scale and perspective. Pieces of paper get torn, glued and then torn again, and replicate beyond control, forming city scapes resembling fuming wastelands.

In a recent project, called Exothermic, exhibited at 'De Fabriek' in Eindhoven, I made a wall that dissects their large hall. In the six-week act of construction lay I coded its inherent destruction. The wall was built from scratch, layer upon layer of geometric structures finally covered by generic drywall. Then the wall was hacked into, seemingly at random, exposing the raw energy of structure, logic and system hidden within, resembling a coal seam fire."

Boris Tellegen

Resume

Born in 1968 - Lives and works in Amsterdam (NL)
Education: 1988-1994 Industrial Design Engineering, TU Delft.

 

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS

 

2011
"abundance", ALICE gallery, Brussels, mixed media and installation
Kunstraum.ch, Basel. installation
"Subduction zones",Muziekgebouw  ‘t IJ, Amsterdam. installation

 

2010
Exothermic, De Fabriek, Eindhoven. installation
Random Distress, Kleerup Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden. mixed media

 

2008
The new Dutch Master, Elms Lesters Gallery, London, UK. mixed media

 

2007
VHDG, Installation, Leeuwarden, NL.

2006
A.L.I.C.E. Gallery, Mixed Media, Brussels, BE.

2004
CUBEX, Installation, Esplanade, SGP.
SLAM JAM, Paintings & Sculptures, Ferrara, IT.

2003
6X6, Hoogt4, Mixed Media, Utrecht, NL.
PERMSPACE GALLERY, Mixed Media, Tokyo, JAP.

2001
rHSTN GALLERY, Mixed Media, Tokyo, JAP.

2000
HOUSTON GALLERY, Sculptures, Seattle, USA.

1998
MUSEE DES BEAUX ARTS, Paintings & Sculptures, Tourcoing, FR.

 

 

 

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

 

2011
"Exothermic", Game City, denbosch, NL, installation
"Onder constructie", RC de Ruimte, IJmuiden, NL, installation
"Blowing up the spot#2", Studio Lukas Feireiss, Berlin, Germany. reliefs

 

2010
BACKJUMPS 4.2, Kunstraum Kreuzberg Bethanien, Berlin, Germany
DE PYRAMIDE VAN IJMUIDEN, RC de ruimte, IJmuiden, NLPUBLIC PROVOCATIONS, Weil am Rhein, Germany

 

2009
DALEK AND DELTA, Elms Lesters Gallery, London, UK.
BORN IN THE STREETS, Fondation Cartier, Paris, France.
D'RAW, Glaspaleis, Heerlen, NLWEARABLE TECHNOLOGIES, NIMK, Amsterdam, NL

 

2008
STACKED AND SCATTERED, W139, Amsterdam, NL.
DE WENS EEN INDIAAN TE WORDEN, Kunstfort Vijfhuizen, Vijfhuizen, NL
FUNDAMENTALS, MU, Eindhoven, NL.IMAGES OF RESISTANCE, Charlotte Fogh, Arhus, Denmark
DANCING ON THE MOON WITH TEARS IN MY EYES, A.L.I.C.E. Gallery, Brussels, BE

 

2007
DON'T DO THAT, Mixed Media, Elms Lester Gallery, London, UK.

 

2006
HYPE, Mixed Media, Elms Lester Gallery, London, UK.
THE WHISTLE TEST, Scion Installation, Los Angeles, USA.

 

2005
Jan Cunen museum, Oss, NL.STATIC FREE, Installation, Space Gallery, Pittsburgh, USA.
BEARBRICK WORLD TOUR, Installation, Gbe at Passerby, New York, USA.
BACKJUMPS-THE LIVE ISSUE PART 2, Installation, Bethanien, Berlin, DE.
POT 'O GOLD, Mixed Medai, Someday Gallery, Melbourne, AUS.

 

2004
ICY GRAPE, Paintings & Sculptures, Elms Lester Painting Room, London, UK.
ROMAMSTERDAM, Mixed Media, Museo Di Roma de Trastevere, IT.BOTTOM LINE, Mixed Media, Skuc Gallery, Ljubljana, SL.

 

2003
WRAPPED IN WARP, Paintings, Eclectic Gallery, London, UK.
BACKJUMPS-THE LIVE ISSUE PART 1, Installation, Bethanien, Berlin, DE.

2002
ANDNOW, Mixed Media, AndA Tokyo/AndA Osaka, JAP.

2001
PLAYTIME, Installation, MU, Eindhoven, NL.

2000
THINKING OF A MASTERPLAN, Installation, Mama Gallery, Rotterdam, NL.

1998
CLASH, Paintings, Kunsthal Rotterdam, NL.
GRAFFITI RELATED IMAGES, Paintings & Sculptures, Mama Gallery, Rotterdam, NL.

 

 

 

GRANTS AND AWARDS

 

2009
Nominatie Amsterdamprijs, Amsterdams fonds voor de kunst

 

2004 
Working Grant, Fonds voor Beeldende Kunsten, Vormgeving en Bouwkunst        

 

2001
Nationale Millennium Prijs, Ministerie van Economische zaken, met Maurer United Architects en Ronald van der Voet voor het ‘Inconstruct’ plan.

 

 

 

COMMISSIONS

 

2012
Facade new building Berlagelaan, Haarlem, NL

 

2011
Statue for Ijside, aluminium, 4,20 m