Danny Matthys

As The World Turns Around', Danny Matthys? most recent body of work, examines global present-day developments. This series of works came about after a trip to the African country of Tanzania. It is a part of the overarching theme of World and Travels. The many travels that Matthys undertook permeate his oeuvre. Memories that were accumulated during these travels ? encapsulated in the concept of Tracking Memories ? are not only those of the artist himself. They encompass also the inherent memories that those visited places carry within them. These places are impregnated with history. The travel tracks in Tracking Memories ? equally a series of works within World and Travels ? are loaded and even literally covered with images. After a long-time involvement with Australia, the gaze returns to Africa. This continent was explored artistically with Hugo De Baere in the 1980s. References to the ?black continent? are explicitly present in Trophées de chasse (1984-1985), a work consisting of photography and collage. Characteristically for Matthys? oeuvre is the building on earlier work in which the particular and the universal, the under-layer and upper-layer, the centre and the periphery meet in symbiosis.