Simmerdei yn Riis (summer in Rijs) 2011 Painting

Jack of all trades, master of none //////////////////////////////// Part-time painter, full-time creative director. Working and living in The Netherlands. //////////////////////////////// Bio: I was born on March, 29th, 1961 in Leeuwarden, The Netherlands. I started drawing from the moment I could hold a pencil. Oh yeah! :-) Besides the fact that it was fun, I collected prizes. I earned my first money and even a 17 jewels incabloc-wrist-watch in drawing and colouring contests. When I was 18 I joined the Art Academy 'Vredeman de Vries' in Leeuwarden, which doesn't exist anymore but in those days was well known by it's high level of education. I studied each evening at the Academy. And earned a living as a freelance photographer and art director in an advertising agency during the day. After 5 years I graduated and I began my career working as a freelance designer, illustrator, art-director and creative director. In 2005, together with two fellow employees, we started our own (graphic and web) design studio. Its very succesful and the creative work for cultural-, educational- and care-organisations is very rewarding. In 2019 I handed in my shares and accepted a position as creative director at a Dutch design and crossmedia company CMG Nederland (creative marketing group). I picked up painting again since the start of the studio in 2005. I create my work 'au plein air' in the spring and summerdays in my boat. And during wintertime I sketch and paint in my painting studio at home. My life experiences, esthetic ideas and education are mixed together to deliver expressive, vivid and sometimes romantic paintings to the world. I am a dreamer. As Diana Vreeland once said; "I believe you see, in the dream. I think we only live through our dreams and our imagination. That's the only reality we really ever know." Amen to that.