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For those who only know the early work of sculptor Leo Vroegindeweij, his sculpture for the Sculpture Gallery is an eye-opener. Whereas his sculptures from the first half of the 1980s were horizontally oriented, the pedestal sculpture is actually higher. Moreover, the austere, geometric look of the pedestal sculpture contrasts with the whimsical and more personal character of his old sculptures.

For the sculpture gallery, Vroegindeweij created a purely abstract, vertical sculpture. To do so, he stacked forty bronze spheres on top of each other. Not randomly, because the centres of the spheres form an imaginary mathematical figure. It is a structure that occurs frequently in nature, such as in molecules and certain chemical compositions. Despite the abstract form language, you can see a figure in a classical pose with a clear standing and playing leg.

In the early 1980s, Vroegindeweij created a furore as one of the Netherlands' new generation of sculptors. With their poetic and personal sculptures, they reacted to the minimalist form language and immaterial art of their predecessors: the minimalists and conceptualists. At the time, Vroegindeweij folded, cut and folded whimsical, abstract sculptures from sheets of lead and brass. They sometimes look like large, grey flowers without stems.

From 1985 onwards, Vroegindeweij incorporated elements cast in concrete or cement in his sculptures. This creates a contrast between the whimsical and hand-moulded metal and the relatively simple, rough castings. In the years that followed, the sculptor increasingly used industrial and prefabricated objects such as sewage pipes, steel chains and kerbstones. He combines these with precious materials such as silver and marble. Despite all these contradictions, a few constants can be identified in Vroegindeweij's oeuvre. Like a true sculptor, he concentrates on principles such as form and counterform, positive and negative, matter and texture. Repetition of forms and size as a guiding principle are also essential.