These works are the result of my project around dance and movement made at Arts Campus The Singel in Antwerp. For this series I started drawing and painting for several seasons at Arts Campus the Singel. Thanks to Vincent Willems, Performing Arts Production, I was given the opportunity to attend various rehearsals of, among others, Anna Theresa de Keersmaeker and Rosas, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Eastman and Wim Van de Keybus. The works are all made in the dark, with only the light of the stage as the only light source. Because of this I was forced to work completely on feeling and I had virtually no control over he end result, so that I also started to experience more freedom while working.

The starting point for this series was mainly to capture a movement and to reproduce the tension between the dancers. Doing this gradually created a kind of symbiosis between what I did on paper and what the dancers did on stage. I tried to reproduce the rhythm they expressed through movement through charcoal and paint.

From the works that I made in the Singel, I continued to work in a large format in my studio. For these works I often played back trailers of the performances, in order to be able to work from the images. That way I was able to recall the tension and intensity, which helped with my large format processing. Working on site in the Singel also helped to evoke the atmosphere in my studio more easily.

In the Singel I always worked with acrylic on paper, whether or not in combination with charcoal or drawing marker. Acrylic is a material that dries faster, which was more convenient to work on site. In my studio I always work with oil on canvas. The works of the Singel are also made entirely in black and white, which was previously a practical choice. Working with colors was not feasible in the dark. In retrospect, the black and white ensures that I have been able to focus more on the light / dark contrasts, which in turn benefited the atmosphere.

In addition to the Singel, I also had the opportunity to work in April during a dance workshop in the studios of Wim Vandekeybus in Molenbeek and in August during a dance workshop by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Eastman.

Project at Art Campus The Singel in Antwerp/Belgium

'Sketches of Emotion' is a hybrid performance consisting of an installation and a contemporary dance performance through which dance and visual arts are meeting. We invite the audience to give their own interpretation to the performance while observing how a dance performance is turned into a timeless work of art.

Through this performance, we aim to give a different interpretation to dance by transforming it into another form of art. In connection with the dancers, the visual artist transcribes feelings, emotions and expressions emanating from the movement onto paper and canvas. By filming the process of drawing and painting and projecting it directly onto a large projection screen placed behind the dancers, we want to give the audience an immersive experience of movement.

Performance Sketches of Emotion

I, Karen Hendrickx, am a visuel artist and I'm currently working  with JC Choreography on a performance. The concept is  to demonstrate the interface between dance and the visual arts. Normaly we should present the premiere during the day of dance on 25/04/2020 in Belgium. Due to Covid-19 the festival was canceled. They managed to create an online version . For our participation we made the video 'sketches of Emotion' , which  is linked to our future performance.

We know that this video is not the most dynamic dance video,  but we tried to work in a creative way during the lockdown. This is the reason why we were not able to work physically together, because of the quarantine. 


Both dancers had to create a choreography in their living room and filmed it outside. The result was two seperate dance pieces. After it I went to my atelier and started to make drawings directly on the movie,  in relation to the dancers and their movements. These drawings are quick sketches, made in a few seconds. In this sketches I try to catch the emotion and the movement that comes from the dancers, rather than displaying an exact image. At the end I gave everything to the video artist Ilke De Vries, who integrated the drawings into the movie.
We determined the composition together. The intention was mainly to achieved a result in which the drawings enter into a game with the dancers. This was the best we could do, working apart but in a collaboration. Hopefully you understand our idea and you can see the added value.

On this page you can see also the drawings made for the movie.

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Karen Hendrickx