Exhibition

Inside my head

Wow, almost a year ago since my last post! Hi there bloggerfriends, are you still there? Although i didn't feel like blogging for some time, i couldn't delete my blog. Because of you, the friends i made on blogger. The stuff we shared back and forth and really, i did miss you! Many of you are also friends on Facebook, but that isn't the same. Facebook is fast and a bit shallow i think. It's fun, but not more than that. While a post on blogger expresses more and deeper, our thoughts and ideas. Right? I am so happy i didn't delete my space here, i am thinking about writing a blog once a month, and if i have time, sometimes a bit more. And i will start visiting all you guys really soon again, hoping that not all of you have left.

Lots of changes the past year. I have moved, again, now living in a wonderful new home with a BIG studio and much light. The house feels great, and it's nice that the neighbors also living in this building are artists as well. More understanding between each other, on the same level as well mostly. Greeting each other. That seems logical i suppose, but in the past neighborhood people didn't greet us, or if they did, it was kind of rigid. We were always strange. And our garden was way too wild. I am so pleased to see that our new neighbors love wild gardens too. Now we have a large garden with space for groceries and fruits as well.

Left side of the garden. Where we grow herbs, groceries (next year) and fruit.

Right side of the garden. Sowing grass and needs more plants ofcourse.  You can make me happy with seeds. Our garden is till the second rainpipe. You see the 3 windows of my studio.

Close-up.

Part of my new studio. It has 3 of such large windows. Lucky girl i am!

Part of our living room. Doors to the garden, a large window and next to it another window. So we have a house full of light. The building was in the past part of a barracks. Our appartment consists of former sleeping rooms. On the other side you can see the same kind of building. Now also appartments for artists. 

My work  was part of some wonderful exhibitions.  Ken Flett was curator of the 'Love & monsters' exhibition in Riverbear, Nova Scotia. Follow the link to my website for more information.
There was a regional artday in the cityhall of Arnhem. Visitors could vote and if you're lucky you can be a part of the national artday in Rotterdam. I did get enough votes, so 9 and 10 november i will be part of this exhibition. 
The owner of gallery Stat21  was on the regional artday and invited me for a group exhibition. Yeay! This exhibition opens august 31, and last till the end of september.

So again; hello dear friends, how are you doing?  I will pay you all a visit to catch up, looking forward to it. Hoping you did stay here on your space too. Nice to meet you again, i hope you feel the same. ;-) I have lots of new work to upload, coming soon. See you!

Hello, happy to see you again!

I feel emptyhanded. The next day i was silent. This is real....

I am always curious which spirits turn up as i draw on my holidays. I drawed the next figures when i was on holidays in Limburg, the south of the Netherlands.



Just a dream i  feel

 

The emptyhanded hunter



Until the next day

  

Silent

  

This is real



Rain, strangers and a new home

Hi there all. Already back at work for 2 weeks but not on the internet much. Holidays are almost over, my kids have one week left, and then everything will be back to normal. We had a lazy vacation, the first week camping we had nice weather, but the second week we went home because of the rain. I do love rain, but this was lots and lots of rain and that's not so nice while camping.  The kids didn't mind luckily. Next year we're off to France or Portugal again LOL.  The first day i had to work again, guess what?  A very hot day with lots of sunshine. Life sucks haha. :-S But i can enjoy the sun when i have my day off.

I wrote about some news i have to tell you when i am back. So here it goes:

first of all i am building a webshop for Splash splash kisses and almost ready for your visit. With lots of nice poppy stuff i think.

But most exciting: we are going to move again! The house we live in now is nice, but we are a bit strange for the neighborhood. We don't have a bourgeois taste so it seems, whatever that means. We drive an old car that takes us to places, thats all that counts right? We don't like to spend lots of money on a shiny new car, if the car drives than the car is sufficient for us. I wear black clothes most of the time, we listen to strange music, we don't like cultivated gardens and environments, the same garden as the neighbors with lots of concrete etc. It seems that some neighbors of us are upset because of our free, a bit wild front and backgarden. But they don't come to us to talks about this, we are very nice people really, they complain to the housing society, so this feels not good.

But in the beginning of next year we are moving to a nice project: Saksen Weimar. This was an old terrain with barracks for the military. When it wasn't in use any longer for the military, it became the place for artists and musicians with concerts and expositions.  And now the housing society is renovating all the beautiful old buildings, and inside the buildings there will be appartments with ateliers. And we are the lucky ones to rent one of these appartments. I have to admit it's a bit of a presomptuous project, there also will be new houses, expensive houses, so the terrain will be much more structured, no large metal statues etc. anymore. This scares some artists off. But i have faith in it, i can see through it. Artists will be artists, you cannot control them. Especially when they are living together, inspiring each other. Another project here in Arnhem, for artists, also a bit presomptuous, also scaring off artists in the beginning, prove i am right. ;-)

It's so nice to live in a home with artists around you yeay! I can't wait haha, but i have to be patient......

An old photograph of the barracks.

This is the gateway to the terrain.

Entering.......



One of the buildings in which our appartment will be build. Our living room has 3 windows, and the atelier next to it has also 3 windows! The width of our garden will be about 14 meters.  Are we lucky bastards or what?



That's it for now. I also have done some new drawings in my holidays, i will upload these in a new post. I will be visiting you all pretty soon. Stay happy!



Swallow the sun

Hi dear blogfriends, i wasn't that much on the internet lately, being busy, and also the sun that invites me to sit in the garden doing nothing but draw. I will be even more quiet because next sunday i will be away for about two weeks. Enjoying even more sun i hope, but relaxing and drawing for sure. :-) I have neglected my blogfriends a bit, but i promiss after the holidays i will visit you all again. And i have much to tell, much exciting good news.  Enjoy the holidays if you have holidays, enjoy summertime when the living is easy. And for my friends on the other side of the world stay warm and cosey in the wintertime.
A big hug to you all!!!

At the moment I
read: Schim (If he lived) by Jon Stephen Fink
see: i close my eyes for awhile because they're tired, so i see fun thoughts popping up in the dark
hear: the sound of the fan
think: about a new home next year
feel: excited about the holidays and about a new home......

Circles: i cannot stop these magical thoughts

The drawing Circles grows and is still growing. New updates.

I cannot stop these magical thoughts. You, driving circles around me. Please, don't hunt me down. I can't hear what you are saying. Please don't hunt, don't hurt me. I'm not ready for the pain. I am not. Where is my mind? I can't stop these thoughts. You, driving circles. You are the blood.......



IT GROWS............

THE GODESS



HER MOODY  FACE



DONT HUNT ME DOWN

CLICK * GOT YOU

CELTIC WOLVES

I wish you all a wonderful, magical week! The words above are expressions. I used the cut up technique: special words from lyrics i listen to while drawing suddenly pop up and i recognize them, the feelings they express and i  use them in the drawing, creating a new story. Interpretations of feelings of myself during the years and of others i noticed. Just to make sure. Although a constant lack of money i am doing fine. And so are my beloved ones. Take care, take care of the ones around you.


read:    De aardbeibeet * Smultronbett by Barbara Voors
taste:    Delicious sweet hot coffee and strawberries

see:      Celtic wolves 

hear:     Into your dreams * Laurie Anderson

think: :  This job is for Jan!
feel:       Full of trust

Why running around in circles?

Hi there all, how are you doing?  I hope all goes well for you. It has been awhile, but life (again) was interfering big time. And when this happens, i find it difficult to communicate. I hide myself  in dreams. Avoiding the big questions, why am i here? what am i doing here? Why art, drawing, painting? Why bother? Why not? Reading La nausee by Sartre doesn't help, or maybe it does. Perhaps i am an existentialist by heart without knowing it. Maybe i am a misantropic humanist or a humane misantrophe. Probably i am both. Can you tell the difference?  I am a pleaser, i want to be loved by everyone. Please, love me. Please, hate me. No, i am not crazy. I am just questioning all. Looking at all possibilities. I don't wanna scare you.  I do not wanna..........  I am a contradiction. Am i not?

Unexpectedly it was there, crystalclear: the existence suddenly revealed itself to me.  From now on it didn't look harmless anymore. Like the safety of abstract categories. It was the stuff of which things are made, the beet of the tree was formed out of existence. The beet of the tree, the fences of the parc, the seat, the teneous grass of the lawn, all this had disappeared. The diversity of things, their own character was only an illusion, a little varnish. The varnish was gone, what was left were monstrous, weak heaps, chaotic and nude. Of a terrifying, obscene nudity.
Jean Paul Sartre  *  The atrocity  (a free, simple translation by me)

Ahhh well it isn't all dark moods, don't worry. The good news is that everything is okay with my beloved ones and myself. So i keep this in mind, again and again, to chase away the dark moods, that holds me back from enjoying all good things around me.  I feel happy looking at my love and kids, the cats, the garden, my art. And i have made a beginning of a new drawing. A wonderful challenge, because the seize of this drawing is 130 x 145 cm!  As i said a real challenge. I wonder how long it will take before the white paper is filled with my world in a world in a world...... 

DRIVING CIRCLES AROUND ME* The beginning of a large painting: 130 x 145 cm

GET READY

    

So tell me what you think about the drawing so far. Take good care of your beloved ones. Take good care of nature. And of yourself ofcourse!
When the low moon begins to beam
every night i dream a little dream.......

What is it?

It must be spring, it sure is looking at this drawing. Because of the beautiful weather (and being busy as well) i spend my time outdoors as much as possible. That's the reason i am not too often behind my desk staring at the computer.  But at the end of the week the weather will be colder again and rainy,  giving me time to pay a visit to all my favourite blogs again. I promise, okay? ;-)

Friends, enjoy spring or fall, both such wonderful seasons of the year. 

I wish we can share all

read: Le mur - Sartre
taste: hot coffee
see: the sun shining 
hear: Silver swans
smell: the spring in the air
touch: the grass on my feet
think: about better times coming my way
feel: lots of joy because of the spring, yeay!

Keep breathing, let's talk about it later

Still working on drawings and paintings for the series Malleus maleficarum.  I wanna place the drawings in black boxes, so that you have to peep inside the boxes to see the drawing. And i paint the silhouettes of the women on large canvasses. White silhouettes on a dark black and red background.

Keep breathing

This drawing is a try out. I've painted all day long on a canvas, working out this idea. One painting finished, and i am happy with it. The silhouette is even more plain white.  Soon i will be posting it.

Let's talk about it later

The silhouette of the try out is from the drawing above. But i have decided that this drawing will not be in the series Malleus maleficarum. Because of the colors (green and blue). The Malleus maleficarum women will only be in white, red and pink. I noticed that these colors emphasize their nudity and therefor there vulnerability.  And that's what i wanna express in these drwings.

read: The memory game * Nicci French

taste: sweet white wine  ~  smell: japanese water incense

hear: Blithe field * illuminating moments  ~  touch: the skin of my paint smutted hands

think: about painting  ~  feel: happy and a bit restless