Ruud van Empel at Stux + Haller Gallery

Wed, Mar 30 - Sat, Apr 23  2016

Through April 23, a selection of works by Ruud van Empel are available for viewing at Stux + Haller Gallery. Van Empel’s digital-composite photographs will complement the new exhibition of Maïmouna Guerrisi, “Sacred Dwellings.” Her work depicts mystical figures from Islamic Africa as spirit guides and ancestral symbols.

About Ruud van Empel

Dutch artist Ruud van Empel (Breda, The Netherlands, 1958) studied at the Academy of Fine Arts Sint Joost, Breda from 1976-1981 and was awarded the St. Joost prize in 1981. His photographic images, digital collages made from fragments of hundreds of his own photographs, strive for content aligned to natural reality though they carry a certain level of surrealism. The artificiality is visible but the final image is a convincing, autonomous reality. 

Van Empel has exhibited widely across the U.S., Europe and Japan. Stux + Haller Gallery has presented seven solo exhibitions of van Empel; the last one, “Identities,” was in 2014.  His works were featured in a solo exhibition during the 2015 edition of the Biennial Foto Art Festical in Bielsko-Biala, Poland and the 2015 edition of Photo Phnom Penh in Cambodia. Van Empel is the recipient of multiple awards and his work can be found in the collections of the Noordbrabants Museum (Netherlands), the Musuem of Photographic Arts (MoPA, San Diego, CA), the Groninger Museum (Netherlands), the French National Foundation for Modern Art (FNAC, Paris), and the Nerman Museum (Kansas City, KS). 

His iconic visions can be found as well, in noted private collections such as Sir Elton John, Christian Louboutin, and the George Eastman House (Rochester, NY). Several books of his works have been published such as Ruud van Empel Photoworks: 1995 – 2010 (2011, PhotoWorks International BV), Ruud van Empel Photoworks: 2006 – 2008 (2009, PhotoWorks International BV), and Picturing Eden (2006, Steidl). Writings on his work have appeared in Vogue (Sept 2014), The Guardian (2013), Kunstbeeld (2013), Le Monde (2013), Tokyo Photo (2010), The New York Times (2008), Elle Décor (2008) and many other international publications.

About Stux + Haller Gallery

In 1980, Stefan Stux and Linda Bayless Stux founded Stux Gallery in Boston. Six years leater they opened the first New York location in 1986. In the fall of 2014, Stephen Haller Gallery of Chelsea, venerated for their renowned 50 year history in New York, joined Stux Gallery as a new affiliate.  The merged quartet composed of Stefan Stux, Andrea Schnabl, Stephen Haller, and Cynthia Griffin Haller is now known as 57 STUX + HALLER.  

The vision of Stux Gallery was always centered on challenging, cutting-edge contemporary work in a context that recognizes its potential, eventual contribution to the larger narrative of art history, an undertaking that we have vigorously pursued for more than three decades, and to which we at Stux + Haller remain steadfastly dedicated today. Stux + Haller Gallery aims to represent a diverse group of artists, drawn from a broad international spectrum including the U.S., Europe, Asia, Australia and Africa.