ARTIST STATEMENT

For over three decades, Arno Kortschot has explored the intersection of form, material, and space through minimalist sculpture. Grounded in geometric abstraction, the work creates a quiet dialogue between object and environment, inviting contemplation, shifting perception, and integrating art into daily experience.

Trained in sculpting and spatial design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Kampen, The Netherlands, his practice has evolved through international exhibitions and public commissions across Europe, Canada, and the United States. From early installations in Dutch cities such as Utrecht, Zwolle, and Laren, to permanent works at Vancouver General Hospital and recent commissions in Fort Worth, each project reflects a commitment to merging visual clarity with structural integrity.

Materiality lies at the core of the process. Zinc, with its evolving patina and timeless neutrality, has become a primary medium, embracing both imperfection and transformation through touch and environment. Bold color, repetition, and subtle illumination are often incorporated to expand the visual impact of each piece, creating sculptural forms that resonate with both architectural and organic rhythms.

The work aims to exist beyond the gallery, inhabiting, enhancing, and quietly challenging the spaces around it. Whether a single leaning form or a constellation of objects casting shadows on a wall, each sculpture serves as an invitation to pause, observe, and reconsider one’s place in space.

Rooted in the tradition of Minimal Art, this sculptural practice explores the intersection of geometry, materiality, and space. For over 35 years, the work has aligned with the minimalist principles: reducing form to its essentials, using repetition, modularity, and industrial materials to create spatial clarity and provoke quiet introspection.

Influenced by the legacy of geometric abstraction in Dutch art and architecture, Arno's work is driven by a desire to strip objects of overt symbolism and allow them to exist as pure spatial concepts. Materials such as zinc are used for their neutral tone, transformative patina, and timeless character, qualities that support the minimalist aim of allowing the material itself to speak. Through repetition, precise placement, and simple forms, viewers are encouraged to engage both physically and psychologically with the object and the surrounding space.

Color and light function as structural and spatial tools, used sparingly but deliberately. In some works, LED illumination is integrated from within, allowing the form to glow from the inside out and adding a quiet pulse to otherwise static structures. The shadows cast by these forms are not incidental but integral, extending the sculpture beyond its physical limits and enhancing the perceptual experience in alignment with minimalism’s interest in phenomenology.

While minimalism is often perceived as restrained, this approach emphasizes warmth and tactility. The work invites engagement through walking, pausing, and observing, encouraging a direct, unmediated experience of material, scale, and light. These sculptures function not only as visual forms but as spatial propositions, reminders of presence, perception, and the human relationship to structure and stillness.

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