collectionpresentation COLLECTIE XXII FANTASY 21 mar 2008 - 21 sep 2008 intervention by Koen van den Broek When the MuHKA began actively presenting its collection five years ago, it concurrently launched an uncommon approach to it. The museum collects everything that can give access to art and relates it to a hypothesis on art. One result of this vision is the format of the intervention; a presentation/ investigation by an artist in the context of the collection. When the MuHKA decided five years ago to invigorate its collection in a radical way, the process was accompanied by an inevitable re-think of the collection policy and of the museum's entire collection philosophy. In this way the emphasis shifted from static presentation to a more research-minded approach to artistic practice as a dynamically intellectual context. 'Research' is central to the display policy of the MuHKA, and one specific type of display, the exhibition as intervention, examines not only the MuHKA collection as such, but also highlights the practice of the 'intervening' artist. In the spring of 2008 Koen van den Broek is the intervening researcher on call. Van den Broek, one of Belgium's leading young painters, at once broadens the range of the intervention format: his presentation research no longer focuses on his own work [which was the case in previous interventions, from Carla Arocha to Pieter Vermeersch], but rather the broader dialogue with recent art history - a dialogue which by definition goes beyond the walls of the MuHKA, as is apparent from his selection of certain iconic works, particularly by American artists, from private Belgian collections. The cornerstones of this selection illustrate Van den Broek's well-known predilection for American Minimalism and American post-expressionist art: his mentors and examples are John Baldessari [with whom Van den Broek is currently working on a collective project], Donald Judd, Robert Mangold - and also William Egglestone, Brice Marden and Jeff Wall. From the MuHKA collection Van den Broek has selected works by such pioneers as Dan Flavin, Bruce Nauman and Ed Ruscha. The 'European' sensibility is embedded in an assortment of works by pre-eminent European artists from private Belgian collections, with Thomas Schütte and Blinky Palermo at the forefront. Van den Broek modelled 'his' presentation loosely on the example of his colleague and good friend John Baldessari, who was guest curator for the exhibition Magritte and Contemporary Art: The Treachery of Images at Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 2007 -- a classic example of the idiosyncratic intelligence of the artist/exhibition-maker with an eye for the 'secret' similarities between different works, oeuvres and practices. In this way, this informal, fantasy-rich dialogue between artworks which, at first glance, seem to have little in common, forms an experimental, speculative and -- ultimately, in accordance with the title of the exhibition - playful setting for Van den Broek's reflection upon his own oeuvre and working method, which in this exhibition are rather modestly represented by a recent series of paintings, some of which were on display at the White Cube gallery in London in the spring of 2007. ____ with works by Nick Andrews, John Baldessari, Charif Benhelima, Marcel Broodthaers, Wim Catrysse, Jan Cox, Luc Deleu, William Eggleston, Tracy Emin, Dan Flavin, Liam Gillick, Mary Heilmann, René Heyvaert, Peter Joseph, Donald Judd, Jan Kempenaers, Robert Mangold, Brice Marden, Gordon Matta-Clark, Paul Mccarthy & Mike Kelly, Bruce Nauman, Blinky Palermo, Robert Perry, Edward Ruscha, Thomas Schütte, Mitja Tušek , Koen van den Broek, William van den Broek, Patrick Van Den Eynde, Wilfried Vandenhove, Jan Van Imschoot, Dan Van Severen, Jan Vercruysse and Jeff Wall