House XVII Painting

The (near) past intrigues me. I can get lost in photographs from my parents youth. Young boy scouts on camp, a mini civilization with its own norms and values, under the supervision of Mr. Pastor. A farm that was also used as a shelter during world war two. A young girl playing in the garden, not minding the camera. A world that’s been and gone and that I associate with innocence, naivety, lost idealism and mortality. Subtle, seemingly unimportant and casual taken pictures in black and white that have created for me an image of this period in time. A time that no longer is, but has also helped form me. These kind of pictures, taken around the middle of the 20th century often are my inspiration source, my starting point. The quiet portraits, silent houses. They emerge as themes in my work, to be passed on. When painting I’m more an observer of my actions than a thinker. I aim for the right balance between making discoveries and creating knowingly, welcoming coincidence. It allows me to explore my personal preferences; what colors, tools, size or surface do I need today? How does the material work, what shapes arise, how do colors respond to each other? Transparency and opaqueness, layering. All contribute to a moment when I recognize the image is finished and the resulting work has become autonomous from its origin. What I find important is the amount of information that I communicate in a painting. My images don't contain much detail, they are not 'finished'. An image has to remain open. Too much detail can make a painting to describing or unambiguous. What is still recognizable in the created image and does it lead to a new or the viewers own interpretation? How does someone else interpret or reflect the given image?