Biography
Jo Vandeleene, visual artist,
born and residing in Belgium, Kortrijk-Heule on 8 October 1961.
is trained as a chemist and has combined a long athletic career — including high-level volleyball and earning Dan rankings in Karate — with a successful career as an entrepreneur. He founded his company specializing in the commercialization of dyes and chemicals for the textile industry.
In that role, he worked closely with international partners, particularly from Germany, Switzerland, China, Korea, and Japan. The cultural values and refinement he encountered through these collaborations left a lasting impression on his worldview and creative sensibility.
Alongside his professional career, Jo pursued a classical arts education at the KASK (Royal Academy of Fine Arts) in Kortrijk. He began in the ceramics studio, developed strong drawing skills through intensive training, and later turned to painting and photography.
Initially, his paintings were figurative and realistic, deeply influenced by his admiration for baroque masters such as Caravaggio, Rubens, Rembrandt, Velázquez, etc... Over time, however, the urge to break free from form became increasingly urgent. The limitations of realism led to a radical shift: from expressive abstraction toward distilled minimalism, with a focus on pure form, rhythm, and material. A continuous search for the essence of painting.
In his current oeuvre, Jo creates abstract minimalist paintings using hand-made paints. His photography seamlessly extends this vision: he captures abstract geometric forms, shadows, and textures in which the recognizable dissolves and the essential emerges.
His work reflects a profound search for silence, balance, and reduction — rooted in a life shaped by science, discipline, and a longing for inner spaciousness.
“As form dissolves, emptiness becomes the space where everything may arise.” — Jo Vandeleene