This exhibition marks the third phase in an ongoing artistic process by HMX and Tiago Hesp, an exploration of authorship, transformation, and surrender. This time they work with reclaimed automotive steel, painting each metal surface in their distinctive visual language: a hybrid vocabulary shaped through years of collaboration and experimentation.
The foundations of this dialogue were laid during Inbetween, an exhibition held at the Kelderman en van Noort gallery in Eindhoven, in which both artists deliberately moved toward one another, bridging differences to meet in a shared space. Through this process, a common visual language emerged. Subsequent collaborations carried this exchange beyond a mutual aesthetic. HMX and Hesp see it as a third mind: a collective way of thinking and designing.
In retrospect, they understand their movement toward one another as a car crash, with the crumple zone as a creative free space where this collective visual expression arose. In STEELBORN, the artists focus on the moment of impact itself, where forms unfold beyond their command, revealing the beauty of the unpredictable.
Once painted, the metal car parts are subjected to an industrial metal crusher, a smaller version of the machines used in automobile scrapyards. At this decisive stage, the artists relinquish control. The compression irreversibly alters the composition, introducing an element that cannot be predicted or corrected. By inviting this intervention, HMX and HESP embrace uncertainty as an essential collaborator in the creative process. As the steel is crushed, forms merge into one another and an unexpected composition takes shape.
The resulting works are understood as Steelborns: steel-born offspring brought into existence through a combination of intention and chance. The artists compare this moment to the birth of a child. Just as a parent encounters a newborn as an independent being, HMX and Tiago Hesp must accept what the works have become and discover the beauty within them. The process is one of recognition, adaptation, and ultimately ownership. Acknowledging the work as something you created, even when its final form exceeds your intention.
Phase III: Welcome Baby Party marks this moment of encounter and celebration. It is the gathering held after the birth, where the Steelborns are introduced to the world. Each work bears the marks of its creators, yet each has developed a character of its own. Together, they form a family of compressed histories and unexpected outcomes.
The opening will take place on Friday, July 17, from 6:00 pm to 8:30 pm.
This show will be on display until August 14, and admission is free.
BIOGRAPHIES
HMX (1975) is a self-taught artist from the Netherlands whose work emerges from a restless pursuit of form, composition, and visual experimentation.
Drawing from his graffiti roots, he has developed an independent visual language shaped by intuition and an ongoing process of discovery. Abstract line drawing lies at the core of his practice, sometimes visible on the surface, but more often directing the rhythm and flow of the composition.
Inspired by irregularities in the urban landscape, nature, and architecture, HMX creates works marked by organic movement, graphic textures, and dynamic energy. Embracing mistakes and unexpected outcomes as catalysts for creation, his work continuously evolves through experimentation and exploration.
Tiago Hesp (1981)is a Portuguese visual artist whose practice is distinguished by its contemporary approach and its strong visual and conceptual impact.
Holding a degree in Scenography from the Lisbon Theatre and Film School, Hesp combines academic training with over two decades of artistic practice. Having also attended the Faculty of Fine Arts in Lisbon, his journey began in graffiti in the late 1990s, evolving into a distinctive authorial language that merges urban art, painting, and installation.
His work is usually anchored in a core concept, developed through a careful, curious, and detail-oriented gaze. His artistic practice is grounded in constant questioning: observing, looking again, changing perspective, and asking once more. For Hesp, creation is an ongoing act of discovery, in which doubt and curiosity act as creative drivers. Each project is born from this attentive listening to the object, the space, and the context, with collage serving as the medium playground to assemble the parts.
Start Date: 2026-07-17
Finish Date: 2026-08-14