Prabath van Zanten

Prabath grew up in a small village in Overijssel but moved to Haarlem in 2013 after living in Amsterdam, among other places. A graduate in communication studies from the University of Twente, he has always felt a urge to paint. According to Prabath, his paintings stem primarily from his fascination with the interaction between lines and colors. His influences lie partly in minimalism, architecture, and constructivism. He strives to let the final result emerge through the interaction of materials, colors, and direction, with minimal intervention.

The conceptual background of his work: His paintings give highly abstract form to his vision of modern consumer society, which is characterized by a state of material abundance. This is expressed in his technique, in which excess, abundant paint drips onto the canvas. Furthermore, his work is characterized by dynamism and complexity—a kind of web in which all manner of choices are interwoven and built up from different layers. Consumer society is fundamentally based on two directions: to buy or not to buy. In his work, this is translated into horizontal and vertical lines. This world of material abundance is substantively empty and therefore does not depict any concrete representations. The result is an abstract work that is substantively meaningless and possesses only visual value. The consumed meaninglessness in the world of material abundance has the potential to be valuable. It is, therefore, purely about aesthetic value. It symbolizes the growing appreciation of the exterior over the interior—form over content.