I'm curious, pragmatic and creative. I express myself in Art, Poetry, Music, Philosophy and Science as everything for me can be art, such as the concept of the package of butter in the high corner of the class room of Joseph Beuys in Düsseldorf. One of the more intriguing art experiences I had during art school. The concept of creating art from an idea. I abandoned the rational idea, I choose the way of starting, entering in a process and create. During that trajectory I find the way and finally the purpose, like the package of butter, which finally ended in the high corner of a class room and started its purpose.
I was and felt always the different one. I decided Art School at the last minute. I wanted to free myself. So I created a shock in the family and this was the first real step to the experience of my solely path in the outside world. In the 70s and 80s all was about a decent job and money making, so I rebelled. Sometimes I get this idea and then I go whatever.. or wherever. My moving was also a must do. Despite this strong mind, I also wanted to be recognized. Only after 60 I discovered that it doesn´t matter anymore and I followed the inspiring words of Cy Twombly about ageing and becoming free(at last). Today I don´t start with an idea but with a feeling or a drive because I have those images or ideas and so I dive in the process of creation to finally end with a result which I sometimes painted over and over again. At the beginning I was inspired by Piicasso´s everlasting easiness of expression and discoveries of styles and its relation with nudes forms and lines. I decided therefore to also take classes in nudes drawing. Very fast I found my style in the impression with many or only a few lines. In the process I found the form through the lines, almost in trance I drew the figures.sometimes I needed only a few seconds. Art school became a discovery when I choose the 3D conceptual class, so I could work on both painting and installations such as the burning figure in the field (1982): the figure was from welded steel and the human forms from tar, then it was positioned in the everlasting linear horizons in the Dutch rural fields and burnt down. The fire was the light, and the heavy was the tar that burnt and liberated itself. A 8mm movie was the end result. There the story ended. In the following year I delivered with concrete covered objects from styrofoam. Again there was this idea of combining heavy and light. Now it was a mountain that looked heavey but was light inside. My end work was a concept of a bridge and a fragile framework with objects like symbols. Here the open skeleton and the lightness of the bridge was the theme. I told them that I needed to take my art with me, as I would go travelling. This work was also shown in the finals of the best of classes in the Netherlands. Only In France (officially as of 1990) when I landed in Bordeaux it became more important. Lines and Graphs were all present in the objects. All my exhibitions between 1986 and 1989 were 3D objects, amongst one I won the assignment for an 1% monumental project for a school, which was very simple and mainly focused on the side that these were children between 4 and 6 years old and so objects should be playful and imaginary for the childeren. By a part of the commision it was criticized because of the lack of grandeur, but it fitted perfectly in that environment and the school preferred. After having left the Netherlands in 1989 to teach silk painting in the South of France, which I tried to take out of the standard way of painting and then to live in France (as of end of 1990), painting became the main expression. The space was smaller and so I went on with figurative abstraction as theme, I used the figures and lines and created ¨spectacles¨ or scenes out of life, where I restarted with lines and graphs with forms with sometimes cubistic influences with color to set the atmosphere. The concern of depth and realism was not my concern, the atmosphere and the lines were. The surprise at the end. To accompany the paintings, I created a multi lined metal structure of a group of people which were together with the paintings visible in galeríes amongst Galerie des Beaux Arts in Bordeaux, the opening of the Dutch week in the Grands Hommes. The lines were like myl lines and graphs bent in a way that it became a 3D idea. Here again it is about the impression, the atmosphere and lines, so the concept and not the people as such. In 1996 it became clear that I had to leave again and my final paintings before I had to stop were the announcement of my son, and the return to the Netherlands. 3 paintings which were finally a strong pre feeling. From 1998 until 2016 I worked on management jobs to earn the living for my son and myself. Only after he left the house and I became ill, I started to work again on my art and had the feeling i wanted to catch up. Then, I moved to France again, bought a big house with the romantic attic to paint. Side ways I worked in consultant jobs. But in 2022 Spain came in sight and a new adventure began. Before I left (2022) I sold 10 pieces of my work to Amsterdam kunstuitleen (www.kunstuitleen.nl) and another 8 pieces to a private person in France. All of these art works have sizes from 100 x 100 cm to 150 x 220 /230 cm (one of my favorite sizes). The other 8 to a private collector in the South of France. In Spain I found my dream house with an every day view on the Mediterranean, in my back the strength of the mountains and on the lowest level of the house my work space. It finally answered maybe my queest on heavy and light. The peace, the silence in the evening except for the sound of the sea and the stillness of a boat which waits for the fish to bite I enjoy the place with the most sun of Europe. In this atmosphere I found that my dreaming found its place to be. Silence has become a friend of mine. Painting the process to free thoughts and feelings.
So now from this silence, I continue to express, not in words, but gestures, simple forms, traces, symbols, but never consciously. ¨The line is a line with the mind of its own, a miracle of the human brain ¨ to say it in the thoughts of Cy Twombly. The colors are my soul who wishes a better world with more light and lightness. The white is my stillness who expressively moves on the surface. Shall we finally reach this world where we can dream without having to look over our shoulder? At least on the canvas I can.
Group in A-Kerk in Groningen - final 1986
Exhibition Group in Centraal Beheer - Apeldoorn - 1986