Since the 1980s, Narcisse Tordoir has been exploring the boundaries and possibilities of painting with stubborn determination. Tordoir studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, but soon shook himself free of the constraints of his classical education. He is constantly exploring new things, and mixes styles and media with apparent ease. Tordoir's works are simultaneously both subtle and direct. As no other, he interweaves romance with harsh reality, history with current events, static images with those in motion, lunacy with seriousness. He elevates painting to an act, a performance. Tordoir is one of Belgium's most important artists, and one of the few who revived painting after it had been ostracized.
