Skeleton

Skeleton (2025) by Berend Strik takes as its subject the internal structure of the body — the framework that supports and gives shape to the physical form, revealed only when the flesh is removed.

The skeleton has been a subject in art from vanitas paintings (where skulls remind viewers of death) to Damien Hirst's glass sculptures. As the most essential structure of the body, the skeleton represents the underlying truth beneath appearances — what remains when everything else falls away.

Strik's textile interventions can be seen as adding flesh to the photographic skeleton — covering the bare structure with something warmer, softer, more alive. Yet they also reveal the structure beneath, making visible what is normally hidden.

The skeleton is also a formal element in composition — the underlying structure of lines and forms that an artwork reveals when analyzed. Strik's stitched photographs expose the skeleton of the image — the formal structure that the original photograph conceals beneath its documentary surface.

Sources: Galerie Fons Welters