About Boris Thorbecke

Boris Thorbecke was born in Amsterdam in 1972 and lives and works in Hilversum close to the forest. Surfer, traveler, street artist, ex-ad man, and an eternal student of life. In the eighties, Boris started as one of the first graffiti writers in the Netherlands and you can see that in his work, but that is not his only source of inspiration. Graduated from the Design Academy in Eindhoven in 1998 he was heavily influenced by the head of the department Gijs Bakker and the Droog Design movement. After his studies, he started working as a freelance art director for clients such as Nike, Greenpeace, and IKEA. All these influences are actually dwarfed by his love for the open and wild nature. That is where everything in his work connects and all his sources can be found in the first place.

The series of complex mixed media collages called 'Infobesity' deal with the effects that the daily and almost unstoppable flow of overstimulation of information, messages, advertisements, messages and social media has on our subconscious.

It is not difficult to also link globalization, digitization, social media and artificial intelligence to this, but then seen from the interpersonal level. How does all this affect our mind. On our dreams, fantasies and, in a broader perspective, perhaps also on our society and personal relationships.

The gigantic works consist of the digital residual material or as Boris calls it; 'visual waste' that can be found on the internet in the form of amateurish vector files, logos of major brands, website UX parts, you name it. He lumps all of this together and supplements it with his own drawings, photos and texts. In the end, everything comes together in a gigantic digital file.

Only vector files so no pixel is involved. This means that the works can be printed infinitely large and everything remains razor-sharp down to the smallest details, while the image from a distance is completely mixed like an expressionist painting. As end material, Boris uses high-quality matte perspex, cloth or wallpaper for larger surfaces or installations, preferably a billboard or a street location with wild-posting techniques known from the street art culture.

In addition, he has always been developing and exhibiting free work in galleries. Boris also goes wide and is inspired by everything around us. From the old masters such as Michelangelo, the chaos in nature to digital mass media. Everything eventually melts together in the subconscious and that's how he wants to show it, like a stream of unprocessed thoughts and dreams.