Artist Statement
Beyond the visible
My work departs from decades of precision and representation. Craftsmanship remains, but control no longer does.
I work between painting and photography. Through a lens-based process, I explore painted surfaces until form begins to dissolve — where texture and color shift into presence. Something unstable emerges, neither fully abstract nor fully figurative.
I am not trying to tell a story. I am not trying to explain.
I stay with the moment before meaning settles.
An image stops me when it begins to breathe — when it stands on its own and resists being fixed. That is when I step back.
Meaning does not live in what is shown.
It remains unresolved.
Beyond the visible — before meaning settles.
— Eric Rugers
Biography
Eric Rugers (b. 1970, Melbourne) is a Netherlands-based hybrid abstract artist working between painting and photography.
His images originate in layered painted surfaces, photographed in extreme close-up until form begins to loosen. Texture becomes presence. Color and light destabilize the frame — something neither fully abstract nor fully figurative.
After more than thirty years in illustration and design, Rugers retains a precise sense of composition and chromatic balance, but no longer works in service of control. In 2022, he left applied precision behind to focus fully on an autonomous fine-art practice.
Working within perceptualism, he creates images that resist narration and refuse explanation. Forms appear, dissolve, and shift in the act of looking.
Influenced by Turner’s light, Rothko’s chromatic depth, and Richter’s tension between presence and disappearance — alongside the Japanese aesthetics of yūgen and ma — his work invites slow looking and rewards sustained attention.
His work was shortlisted and acquired by the Museum of Avant-garde (Switzerland) and received the Silver Prize in ArtAscent’s international Abstraction competition.
In Conversation
The Door to Resonance: Eric RugersFeatured in The Ambrosia Journal, Ambrose Creatives.
Read the full interview
Recognition and Exhibitions
2026 — Shortlisted, BBA Photography Prize Exhibition, Berlin
2026 — BBA Photography Prize, Pic(k)s of the Day
2026 — Art-Icon Exhibition, Paris
2026 — UNFIXED, Ambrose Creatives — Visit the online exhibition
2026 — NOCKNOCK Art Fair, Amsterdam
2025 — Silver Prize, ArtAscent (Abstraction)
2025 — Antanas Sutkus MA-g Award (Finalist)
2025 — Hungry Eye Fair, Amsterdam
2024 — Graciela Iturbide MA-g Award (Finalist)
Works acquired by the Museum of Avant-garde, Switzerland
EDITIONS
Limited editions
Archival pigment prints on Hahnemühle German Etching
For availability and inquiries — instant@ericrugers.com
Archival pigment prints on Hahnemühle German Etching
For availability and inquiries — instant@ericrugers.com