Leon van den Eijkel

Leon van den Eijkel (15 October 1940 – 15 April 2021) was a Dutch-born New Zealand artist who studied at The Hague's Royal Academy of Art from 1958 to 1963, and emigrated to New Zealand in 1986. Van den Eijkel exhibited widely in Europe, the United States, and New Zealand, and is represented in many major public and private collections.

Biography Van den Eijkel was born in The Hague on 15 October 1940. He studied at the Royal Academy of Arts, The Hague, from 1958 to 1963. and emigrated to New Zealand in 1986. He first settled in Wellington, remaining there until 1998, before moving to Auckland, where he lived for the rest of his life.

Style His use of colour has been heavily influenced by the works of Mondrian which he saw as a child in his native Netherlands. After moving to New Zealand and visiting the kauri forests he was inspired to produce a series of works based on urban trees which culminated in the Urban Forest sculpture in Wellington. This work has the size and heft of a kauri tree trunk combined with his trademark primary colours. He collaborated on this work and other large fabricated steel pieces with the engineer Alan Brown and the team at Metal Art Ltd.

Public collections He is represented in major international collections including: The Black Paintings (1997) New work Studio, Wellington New Zealand Tourism on the Line (1998) - Galerie Y-burg, Amsterdam The Smiling Windmills (2008) – Avalon Park, Lower Hutt, New Zealand Cross(Road) (2009) – Sculpture on the Gulf, Waiheke Island, New Zealand The Remembrance Windmill (2009) Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi Beach, Sydney, Australia Colour Coding (2012) New paintings and works on paper. Bowen Galleries, Wellington NZ Baubles (2013) Brick Bay Sculpture Trail, Warkworth, New Zealand The Playing Windmills (2014) Hobsonville Point Primary School, Auckland New Zealand The Geometric Totem Pole (2017) Brick Bay Sculpture Trail, Warkworth, New Zealand..