Shape of Color

De Brock is pleased to present Shape of Color, a group show including work by Bernard Frize, Imi Knoebel, Robert Mangold and Landon Metz.

Color and form have long occupied a central place in the language of abstraction, each continually redefining the other. Often misunderstood as merely something applied to a surface, color itself can become structure, define space, and determine the very shape of a work. This exhibition traces four distinct approaches to abstraction in which color is not descriptive, but constructive.

Across generations, these artists have each challenged the conventional relationship between color and composition. Bernard Frize approaches painting from a unique perspective, embracing predetermined processes that allow gesture and chance to coexist. His luminous, interwoven brushstrokes produce surfaces in which color emerges through method rather than expression, revealing painting as an event rather than an image. For Imi Knoebel, color becomes inseparable from the object itself. His rigorously composed works dissolve the boundary between painting and sculpture, using geometry and material to construct a physical presence that extends beyond the pictorial plane.

Robert Mangold further expanded painting's formal vocabulary through shaped canvases, geometric structures, and subtle chromatic relationships that invite slow, contemplative looking. Representing a younger generation, Landon Metz continues this investigation through fluid, biomorphic forms that hover between figure and ground. His restrained compositions emphasize rhythm, repetition, and the quiet emotional resonance of color, demonstrating how abstraction continues to evolve while remaining rooted in fundamental questions of perception.

Despite their differing methodologies, all four artists share an enduring commitment to abstraction as a language of visual experience rather than representation. Their works reject illusion in favor of presence, asking viewers to engage directly with scale, rhythm, proportion, and chromatic relationships. Here, color is not merely seen - it is felt as weight, movement, balance, and space.

Rather than presenting a linear history, the exhibition brings together works that resonate across time, demonstrating how each artist has redefined the possibilities of color as form. Together, they remind us that abstraction remains one of contemporary art's most vital arenas for experimentation, where the simplest elements (line, shape, and color) continue to generate endlessly complex experiences.

The opening reception will be held on Saturday, August 8th, from 5 till 8 pm. We're looking forward to welcome you, please email us for more information.