Image: Constantin Nitsche, Le Roucas Blanc II (detail), 2024-2026. Photo: Thomas Merle. Courtesy of the artist and Xavier Hufkens, Brussels
Xavier Hufkens will present Constantin Nitsche’s second exhibition with the gallery, ‘Les mains’, at its Van Eyck venue in Brussels from 27 August to 31 October 2026. The exhibition brings together recent paintings that move between self-portraiture, still life, domestic objects and Mediterranean landscapes. It opens on Thursday 27 August from 5 to 8pm.
The exhibition’s title comes from a letter Franz Kafka wrote to Milena Jesenská, including the line, ‘I can’t hold enough of you in my hands’. For Nitsche, the phrase reflects the unstable relationship between painting and its subject: images can approach something without ever fully possessing it. The gallery describes the works as elusive and open to interpretation, resembling suspended moments without a fixed beginning or end.
Developed in Nitsche’s studio in Marseille, the paintings are made through layering, revision and subtraction. Earlier states are not always completely removed, leaving traces beneath the surface. The artist’s process moves between direction and response, with paintings reaching completion through restraint—at the point where another mark might weaken rather than deepen the image.
This approach is visible in ‘Nature morte au melon’, where foreground, background and a printed tablecloth appear to merge. Other works return to motifs that have appeared throughout Nitsche’s wider practice, including plants, interior decoration and domestic objects. The Ficus plant reappears in ‘La Visite VI’, while a yellow floral screen and crystal ball connect that painting with ‘La Canicule III’. Pink flowers recur across several canvases, and the artist’s wife is a continuing presence throughout the exhibition.
Two paired paintings, ‘Les mains’ and ‘La main’, directly echo the exhibition’s title. In one, Nitsche’s wife holds a recognisable pink flower; in the other, a red flower resting on a table reappears in the artist’s hand. The pairing suggests an exchange rather than possession. Elsewhere, the landscape around Marseille enters the work: ‘L’horizon (Février)’ observes the sea from a particular time and viewpoint, while ‘Le Roucas Blanc II’ begins with observation before becoming something newly constructed through painting.
A further point of reference is a self-portrait of Nitsche as Pinocchio, shown with a wooden nose and oversized hat. The image treats self-portraiture as both likeness and construction, placing the artist before James McNeill Whistler’s ‘Nocturne in Black and Gold — The Falling Rocket’ (c. 1875), held by the Detroit Institute of Arts. The Pinocchio motif also connects with Nitsche’s longstanding interest in the story of Geppetto and the human puppet.
Nitsche was born in 1987 in Ludwigshafen, Germany, lives and works in Marseille, and studied painting at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. His selected exhibitions include ‘La Valse des fleurs’ at Collection Lambert in Avignon in 2025 and ‘Oranges et Lavande’ at Xavier Hufkens in Brussels in 2023. ‘Les mains’ will be on view at Van Eyck from 27 August through 31 October 2026.
The gallery is open Tuesday to Saturday, 11am to 6pm, and a press release for the exhibition can be downloaded from the exhibition page. 'Les mains' opens the gallery's autumn season across its three Brussels spaces: Tatiana Trouve’s 'The Auxiliaries', her first solo exhibition in the city, opens at St-Georges on 10 September; Sayre Gomez’s 'Sim City' opens at Rivoli on 24 September; and Lesley Vance returns to St-Georges on 19 November with what the gallery calls her largest exhibition to date.
