Postcards from Brussels

Dave McKean is a Renaissance man. The multi award-winning illustrator and comic book artist is: a filmmaker (visionary), a photographer (haunting), a graphic designer (inventive) and, last but not least, a musician (jazz pianist).

Heis probably most famous for his numerous collaborations with fellow Brit and fantasy writer Neil Gaiman. Together the 40- somethings have created cult classic graphic novels like The Sandman series and Black Orchid. Most recently, McKean illustrated Gaiman’s celebrated children’s novel The Graveyard Book, and he also created the images for Gaiman’s now-immortalised 2002 novella Coraline.

McKean's style is not just unique, it’s downright uncanny. By incorporating techniques such as painting, drawing, collage and found objects, he transforms simple yet surreal images into snapshots of anguish and beauty. His directorial debut, Mirrormask, is an exceptional example of his love for mixed media and illustrates his trademark magical cum ominous, out-of-this-world quality.

Postcards from Brussels – the title says it all – is a compelling exhibition for us Belgians. The fourth in a series (after Vienna, Paris and Barcelona), it is based on McKean's stay in our wonderful – and dirty and hodgepodge – capital last year. Images from Brussels, like the infamous Manneken Pis, become dreamlike, aided by the simple elegance of pen-and-ink. Pages from his own graphic novel Cages are also featured in this show at Petits Papiers in Brussels.

There are also several of McKean’s mesmerizing nitrate paintings. These larger and darker works are a combination of oil paint, papier-mâché, collage and glued on objects like leaves, rocks and even dolls that create a kind of relief sculpture. With qualities both scattered and artificial, these disturbing portrayals of the human psyche jump out and grab you by the throat.

The icing on the cake, however, is a painting of Coraline. Yes, that would be the same Coraline that is now a 3D stop-motion movie by Henry Selick, now playing across Belgium (and the rest of the world).

The painting on show beautifully illustrates the duality in not only the character but in the story of a girl who finds a peculiar door in a room of her parents’ new, rambling country home. Behind it is a portal to... her own house. But nothing there is quite like it should be.

Flanders Today June 17 2009