About Astrid Stoffels

My work is about the creative and destructive force of nature, and the beauty and fragility that come with it.

I work with oil paint, cold wax, mixed media combined with photography on linen, wooden panels and aluminium dibond. My inspiration comes from special moments and views in my surroundings—in the street and often in the forest—which I capture with my camera. These can be tiny details or wide vistas that stand out because of light, colour, texture, beauty or decay.

The photographs and impressions function as a visual diary and a source of inspiration for new ideas.

Back in my studio I translate those ideas into paintings. I create a fictive landscape that responds to the emotions the original image evoked in me. As a result, the final landscape is often abstracted from reality and floats between figurative and abstract. Sometimes I edit the photographs and incorporate them into the artwork.

Besides my own photographs, news reports and documentaries about nature and the environment are also a source of inspiration. Both the beauty of nature and natural disasters move me and stir something I want to capture—perhaps as a counterweight to the finiteness of life to which humans and nature are subjected. I want to visualise both the creative and the destructive side.