Pierre Louis Geldenhuys | Textile Tessellation in Contemporary Art | An Exclusive Interview

“I challenge the viewer to participate in intriguing exercises in visual interpretation. My works invite the observer to see beyond the forms derived from the obvious, integrated, or progressive aesthetic preferences the brain naturally transmits.” – Pierre Louis Geldenhuys

Textile Tessellation in Contemporary Art | The Invention Of A New Language

Pierre Louis Geldenhuys is a versatile artist from South Africa. He was born in 1971 and currently lives and works in southern Spain.
His diverse artistic journey began with Theater Crafts and Fashion Design studies at the esteemed Tshwane University of Technology in Pretoria and the Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town. During the mid-nineties, he embarked on a professional trajectory, initially working in the Costume Props department of The State Theater in Pretoria and later as a fashion and haute couture designer for the renowned Rosenwerth brand in Cape Town. 
Pierre Louis Geldenhuys also left his mark as an interior designer, mural painter, and sculptor, contributing significantly to various creative platforms and collaborations. Notably, he showcased his talent in television advertisements for Honda and contributed designs to the Young Designers Emporium (YDE) and Coast Line Clothing. His creative acumen was further highlighted when he participated in the ‘Fashion Your Future’ television competition in South Africa, ultimately reaching the finals and establishing a prominent presence in the fashion industry.

In 2009, Pierre Louis Geldenhuys ventured into entrepreneurship, founding his own clothing brand, “Pierre Louis The Art of Dressing,” specializing in ready-to-wear and haute couture, based in the vibrant city of Cape Town.

In 2012, drawn by Spain’s allure, Pierre Louis relocated to Madrid and traveled to the historically rich southern cities, where the enchanting Arab architecture ignited his passion and creativity. This profound encounter inspired him to explore the realms of textile art, geometric patterns, and mosaics, marking a pivotal moment in his artistic evolution.

“I also experiment with the concepts of opposites, contrasts, open and closed shapes, regular and irregular polygons, and the use of color, getting closer and closer to abstraction in my search for an intricate visual expression.”
– Pierre Louis Geldenhuys

Pierre Louis Geldenhuys is an exceptional artist whose innovative work has captured the attention of audiences worldwide. His unique combination of silk or fiberglass tessellations with lighting technology has given rise to a new artistic style.
Geldenhuys showcases his remarkable creations in light boxes, carefully considering composition, space, color, light, and shadow as if they were a canvas.
We are thrilled to share an engaging interview with Pierre, focused on three series of his artworks and exhibitions:
■ ‘DAGGERS AND CRYING’ at Galería de Arte Luisa Pita (Santiago de Compostela, Spain. 2023)
■ ‘FIBERS THAT SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES’ presented by Galería de Arte Luisa Pita at Galería Nueva Las Letras (Madrid, Spain. 2022)
■ ‘KALEIDOSCOPE. GEOMETRIC VISIONS’
at Malvin Gallery (Madrid, Spain. 2019)

An Exclusive Interview With
Pierre Louis Geldenhuys
By Ariel SU

Art Market Magazine: It’s a great pleasure to interview you, Pierre. Your exceptional art is inspiring and visually stunning. With a strong background in the fashion design and textiles industry and extensive experience creating fashion for theater productions, advertisements, and high-end brands, you shifted your life to the contemporary art field. Did you grow up in an artistic environment?

Pierre Louis: As children, we often visited my grandparents at their small holdings during school holidays. My grandmother always had some art and craft projects planned for us, varying from lino printing to color painting and knitting. From an early age, I had a keen interest in fabric and sewing, which I subsequently learned both from my mother and grandmother. Art was my favorite subject at school, and my art teacher was a great inspiration to me. Both my parent supported my love for art and music. 

Art Market Magazine: Looking back on the years of academic studies in fashion, would you say they were the base of your artistic development and knowledge and shaped your visual approach to art?

Pierre Louis: Yes, definitely. The various techniques and subjects that I studied, from figure drawing to textile design, allowed me and gave me the freedom to explore fabric as an artistic expression. Although I am skilled in various art disciplines, when I started as an artist, I knew that textile art was what I wanted to do and what I was best at.

Art Market Magazine: Where does the passion for geometric art come from? What attracted you to Spain and the Arabic geometric architecture and design? What does it represent for you?  

Pierre Louis: I have always loved geometry and have a solid three-dimensional insight. This love for geometry was strengthened when I visited the South of Spain. The Moors that occupied the south of Spain decorated their palaces with geometric shapes, particularly tessellation art, which fascinated me. What struck me most was their unique way of designing and decorating without representing any living form.  As a result, I am constantly looking for patterns in my everyday life, whether in the walls of the Alhambra in Granada or the tiles of a sidewalk.

“Many people are doing paper tessellation; however, I am the only artist combining tessellation with raw and shot silk, mounted in a lightbox that creates an x-ray effect to show the different pleats. ” – Pierre Louis Geldenhuys

Art Market Magazine:  The art and unique techniques you’ve developed are truly captivating. You are using exceptional materials, such as hundreds and thousands of meters of thread, which not only cross and knot the folds of the fabric but are also combined with special lighting effects. Could you share the story behind the creation of this remarkable technique? What inspired you to pursue its development?

Pierre Louis: My technique is called tessellation, invented by the Romans in their mosaics and then perfected by the Arabs in their architecture. In the 70s, paper tessellation was invented by a Japanese man called Fujimoto. Many people are doing paper tessellation; however, I am the only artist combining tessellation with raw and shot silk, mounted in a lightbox that creates an x-ray effect to show the different pleats. The driver in my work is aesthetic, but in the last two years, I have conceptualized it by intervening my artworks with thread (at times other materials), trying to represent the crying of the planet as a result of continuous human threats and attacks to nature, but also the hope through the settlement of threads and silk, inspired by the life cycle of vines.

Art Market Magazine: Childhood elements, objects, and the games of shapes and colors play a significant role in your artistic journey. For example, your impressive series of works, “KALEIDOSCOPE. GEOMETRIC VISIONS,” which was exhibited in a solo show at the Malvin Gallery in Madrid a few years ago, presents the laws of probabilities, as well as a phenomenon of light reflection in a methodical dance that generates unique geometric combinations full of color and expressiveness.
What is the philosophical idea behind this series of work? Are these artworks a way to maintain the childhood atmosphere?

Pierre Louis: I have always been fascinated by the images produced by kaleidoscopes and the educational geometric toys I played with as a child. I remember one specific toy where you had to fit the correct shape into the hole in a ball.
This exhibition is inspired by these memories and represents very well all the work that I have done so far. I am trying to show beauty, harmony, color, and light effects in infinite geometrical combinations while I am limited by the size of the fabric (silk) and the constraints of LED technology.

Art Market Magazine: We can see a development in your artistic style through one of your latest series, ‘FIBERS THAT SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES,’ exhibited with Luisa Pita to Galería de Arte, in the space of  Galería Nueva Las Letras in Madrid in 2022. The artwork became more serious and monotonic in color. Silk fabrics, fiberglass, and LED light are the primary materials that create aesthetic effects and express interpretations of tradition and technology. What shifted you from playing with extreme color to putting most of the viewer’s attention to the shapes on a mild base?

Pierre Louis: Color has always been keen in my work, even in this series. In fact, in this body of work, there are six fiberglass works in different colors aiming to experiment with a different fiber. In the silk artworks, I mostly tried to steer the viewer’s attention back to the shadows and folds that both the white silk combined with the light create and also to start conceptualizing my work and attract the spectator’s attention to the thousands of meters of colorful threads representing the suffering of our planet. These threads by Gütermann are made from recycled polyester bottles to show that I am committed to using environmentally friendly materials.

“I wish to convey the urgency of listening carefully to the cry of nature and the need to save the planet while providing an optimistic vision of the world through an eco-positive message regarding our future.” – Pierre Louis Geldenhuys

Art Market Magazine: Your recent series of works featured in the ‘Of Daggers and Cries’ exhibition in Galería Luisa Pita are exceptional in sophistication and the extraordinary technical level you developed. The creation of the geometric pattern, the sewing, and the interweaving of the threads… all at an uncompromising and unique level. This is indeed the creation of a new language. Could you share an overview of the workflow for creating new artwork? Where does the inspiration for a new piece come from? Do you start by creating sketches or using apps to generate models before beginning the work?

Pierre Louis: My 5km morning run in the fresh air is like meditation. It’s my time to clear my mind and be in the present. Many of my most creative ideas have come during one of these runs. Something unique happens when combining physical activity with a focused mind.
I might think of shapes that I would like to incorporate into my work or alternative angles of delivering a message through my work. For example, in my previous series, ‘Fibers that Speak for Themselves’, I created a new conceptual language and an artistic change of direction, and I took a huge leap in my visual rhetoric with the use of threads to express my concern about the deterioration of the environment. In this new series Of Daggers and Crying, I strengthen the need to preserve and heal the planet in an active way with gradient-dyed and draped silk settled at the bottom of the artwork, a metaphor that embraces the entire exhibition and revolves around the cyclical pruning of the vine, a purely human process that does not kill, just flatten uncontrolled growth, enabling rebirth, life, and fruit each year.

The first step in starting a new artwork is working with paper to develop a pattern that will ultimately be translated onto the silk fabric. I often use graphic programs like Photoshop to determine how the shapes I have created can be repeated. To answer your question, I hardly ever make sketches, only on rare occasions taking notes when I could not go straight to my studio to start creating.

Art Market Magazine: What awaits us? Any new scheduled exhibitions in 2024? Where can the viewers see your artwork?

Pierre Louis: I have taken 2024 to focus on production as my work is very labor-intensive, and one piece can take up to a month to complete. However, I have recently started exhibiting at Knysna Fine Art Galley in Knysna, South Africa, where my work can still be seen.
I will also be showcasing my latest works with Galería Luisa Pita at the following events:  
Art Miami Fair ’24, USA, will be held from December 3rd to 8th, 2024.
Art Madrid Fair ’25, Spain, running from the 5th to the 9th of March 2025.
Solo exhibition in the Art gallery in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and then travel to Madrid in Espacio Jovellanos. 
In parallel, I’m also working on a proposal for a retrospective exhibition in Le musée Matisse du Cateau-Cambrésis in France in 2025.

See the full article in Art Market Magazine Issue #100