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Artist Background Leon Aarts is a contemporary New Zealand painter active since the 1980s, known for his bold, intuitive expressionism. Heavily influenced by his grandfather, the Dutch naive artist Leonardus van de Ven (Nardus, d. 1957), Aarts channels familial artistic lineage into works that blend abstraction with emotional and socio-political bite. Based in Christchurch, he's exhibited in group shows (e.g., West Melton Art Exhibition 2008) and maintains an online presence on platforms like Saatchi Art, ArtMajeur, and Absolute Arts. His oeuvre explores themes of excess, identity, and crisis, with pieces like Spent (2008) and Road Rage (2012) echoing this painting's intensity. Aarts is an emerging-to-mid-tier artist in the Kiwi scene, prolific (137+ works on ArtWanted as of 2024) but not...

The Harmonic Framework: These are powerful frequencies with deep resonance in multiple traditions: 144 (12²) appears in sacred geometry, biblical numerology (144,000), and musical harmonics 288 is the doubling—an octave relationship that creates harmonic resonance and amplification In Your Painting: The apparent chaos is actually organized around harmonic principles. What reads as explosive fragmentation may actually be depicting wave interference patterns, where frequencies interact, creating areas of constructive interference (brightness, density) and destructive interference (dissolution, the void). The visual "vibration" in the work—that sense of energy oscillating—now makes sense as a deliberate attempt to capture frequency and resonance on canvas. The compressed and expande...

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ART “PART 4:(Source)

ART In Pose 5, a sun-seared Christ dangles from geometric arms in cubist descent, his fragmented form a tender, tottering bridge from Calvary to quietude.Jesus sufferd for all.(Source)

Leon Aarts b. 1961 Let’s Go Shopping Acrylic on deep canvas, 2011, 500 x 400 x 80 mm | Signed & dated Painted in the wake of the devastating February 22, 2011 Christchurch earthquake, this explosive work fuses surreal clocks, collapsing architecture, and defiant shopping bags into a hymn of resilience. Aarts’ most celebrated post-quake statement. “Even when the world tilts, we still reach for tomorrow.” — Leon Aarts, 2011 Overall Rating: 45.5 / 50 ★★★★½ (4.6 Stars) “A post-quake masterpiece — Aarts’ most powerful, collectible work.”

Leon Aarts b. 1961, Christchurch Manchester Street, Christchurch (Post-Quake) Acrylics on canvas, 2013 ~600 x 500 mm | Signed lower right Painted two years after the February 22, 2011 earthquake, this work transforms shattered façades into screaming faces and rubble into flesh. The defiant nude rises from the red zone — a surreal requiem for Manchester Street. “By 2013, the dust had settled. The wound was still open.” — Leon Aarts, 2013   Overall Rating: 47.5 / 50 ★★★★¾ (4.8 Stars) “Aarts’ mature Guernica — the definitive elegy for Manchester Street.”

ART Leon Aarts b. 1961 Blind Date Acrylic on shaped canvas, 2008 ~600 x 450 mm | Signed Aarts 08Two strangers wait under a blood-red lamp — awkward, absurd, quietly haunting. Painted on cut-out canvas, the figures lean out of the wall like eavesdroppers from a David Lynch film.“Love at first fright.” — Leon AartsEstimated Value: $3,800 – $5,200 USD(Source)

"Let's Dance (1982) shows Leon Aarts at age 21, already confident in color and composition, celebrating human joy through simplified forms. Over 43 years, his work has evolved from this celebratory beginning to the complex existential questioning of his mature practice—but the core commitment to authentic human experience remains constant. From dancing figures to earthquake survivors, from joy to trauma to transcendence, Aarts has spent four decades painting what it means to be human." The beginning of a serious, committed artistic practice that has now spanned more than four decades.

"Mediterranean Street (1982) reveals Leon Aarts' inheritance of his grandfather's gift for painting light. Like Nardus van de Ven's forest landscapes, this work demonstrates sophisticated understanding of atmospheric color and luminosity. At age 21, Leon was already working in the observational tradition his grandfather established—railway worker and grandson, both understanding how light transforms what we see."