Roofscapes represents a continuation of a decades-long obsession for Hendrik Kolenberg, the obsession of moving about, looking, and drawing/painting that which he sees. It is an obsession that began in 1973 in London and has continued throughout his more than 20 years in Sydney. It follows him in his travels as well, as can be seen in some of the works that capture roofscapes from streets in Paris, Eindhoven and The Hague.

There is an allure to the everyday, the objects and structures we don't notice in our normal day-to-day bustle (stupor some might say), when they are presented in this way. Previously unseen points of interest are revealed, juxtapositions become evident, and a previously flat background to our city lives is rendered again three-dimensional in these two-dimensional representations.

The key ingredient is light, and it is the triggering of perception (of noticing something) when highlighted or intensified by a particular play of light or contrast of light, darkness and shape that most captures Kolenberg. In that sense, these works are still life on a grand scale, where the arrangement is the urban environment and the sun the light source.

Born in Rotterdam 1946, Kolenberg has lived in Australia since 1952. His early art training and career was in Adelaide, where he studied drawing, watercolour and oil painting, and taught art in secondary schools and as an education officer at Art Gallery of S.A. Following a period studying 19th century Dutch art in the Print Rooms of Dutch museums & at the RKD, The Hague, Kolenberg returned to Australia and held several senior curatorial positions including Curator of Prints and Drawings, Art Gallery of W.A., Curator of Art, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery and (most recently) Senior Curator of Australian Prints, Drawings and Watercolours, Art Gallery of N.S.W. Kolenberg began exhibiting his own drawings and paintings in 1996 and has had several solo exhibitions and participated in many group exhibitions since then.