Notes after 2005

The oceanic feeling (2004-2006)

My lineairism is based on Sigmund Freud's understanding of the oceanic feeling. This means, the experience of solving space, a feeling that I translate into my drawings, the disappearance of objects and background. The eye of the beholder is no support. It wanders between recognisable and unrecognisable items. It looks in the game of the lines. Thus the drawing depicts the resolution of the border.

The linear versus lineairism (2006)

The term lineairsm grew out of a misspelling. Yet the term more answered my intention in relation to the visual arts. As the word lineairism is outside of language rules, so it takes my work its own way.
Linear in the workforce of many artists, as art historians propose, is a spaciousness, by putting the lines suggested in the right place. There arises a mass shadow by drawing close together intersecting lines.
My lineairism consists of parallel lines and treats the surface with no one part given more attention too, than the other part; so that a plane remains. The depth does not arise in the technical skills of drawing the mass of the objects, but in the search for the inner space by means of a flat padded surface.

Timeless (2006-2007)

In 2006 I looked at my own work for a variation; in order to break the monotony, of my flat padded canvass; they were always full of lines. Ultra Marine planes next to the padded surfaces to convert the spaces were preferable; also, I looked for a spatial effect. I continued to hold to figuration. But at the turn of the lines is my inner space without a time. I concluded that it was not the planes but the act of putting in the lines, was important to me.

Alleen, Berichten uit de isoleercel, (2006-2007)

Alone, Messages from the isolation cel

After the outsiders had inspired me to start drawing again, the book Alleen (Alone) gave me the opportunity to put down my own crazy experiences. The drawings are about my madness but are not made during the madness. It became clear to me that I never made this work; and could not have made this work; when I had no distance to my experiences, it provided all kinds of crazy events, calls, and depressive reactions. It yielded the conclusion; that the work of Heidelberg's collection of art and many 'crazy' artists, can not be made during their psychosis but in the period after or in between. Because during a psychosis very many different things happen than in making a beautiful drawing, It is often assumed that they are fully working in isolation. But when I compare this with my own experience this tells something about the art, although the isolated experience of psychosis and depression, is not entirely unrelated to the tradition of portraiture. Elements from the culture are incorporated after some recovery of the psyche.

Devotion (2008)

There arose, surfaces in my work, this time black blue planes. I worked mainly on portraits, I found it again, that I was not the virtuoso but in devotion. This is what I pursue. The experience of the divine; this is built around it all of my life. Because, after I draw; I then practise a lot of yoga. Through yoga I have learnt the following lessons from the book, Patanjali's Sutras; Zien door Yoga by Jogchem Dijkstra and Salvatore Cantore, p. 23.

Tada drastuh svarupe vasthanam

[...] There is something in man that is in and behind all his doings, whether his perceptions and wishes, all his feelings and thoughts, is present as a serene and silent spectator. The stronger the whirling of the mind, the more that whirling hides or obscures the viewer. Only when the swirling has stopped, the focus of your mind is focused on seeing in you, only then one can come home to oneself. Only then can the core of your humanity be experienced.

Death (2009)

In the series Vive Memor Leti (Living with death always in mind, of Perseus), death is not portrayed as a threat but as an uncertainty that accompanies life. Death is only complete because, without death there is no life.

Transcendence (2010a)

An alchemical way to make gold, is a good metaphor to describe my rhythmic act of drawing. The alchemical way to make gold shows what is going on in my brain during the drawing. In trance, I explore unknown areas that are off in the recesses of my mind and put on the paper. The result is about madness, feelings or death. In the transcendental act the gold becomes living.

Transcendence (2010b)

Experiencing life is the hardest thing people can. Also, I struggle with it. Often we do not want to experience our feelings. We are afraid of pain, fear and all kinds of bad feelings. But through yoga, I learned to stay together with my own feelings. Not in someone else's joy or sorrow to sit, but in what my body told me. And then bewilderment turns into surprise, sadness into joy, fear in courage and pain into love. It is no easy task to turn it over, but now six years practicing yoga, I tasted this and that is more than enough to go through with it. The temptation of all vices are very large, but when a piece of light has been seen, one knows there is no turning back.