"Embrace # 3-black - Limited Edition of 5" Photograph

Statement

“I work intuitively and am attracted by the beauty of the ordinary. I seek to discover the connection and vulnerability and look for coherence without wondering why or how.”



Bio

I have been creative since i can remember, drawing, painting and photographing the world around me. I have been working as a photographer for 25 years and now, shooting commercial and editorial assignments. My studio is based in the small village of Rijnsaterwoude, near Amsterdam.

I make my art because it is a necessity, it makes me happy and meaningful, i want to share the emotions i see and feel through the images i create. I am attracted by classic themes such as vulnerability, darkness, blasphemy, passion. Looking for the symbolism in the ordinary. The ordinary is what inspires me, the simple things that can have great meaning if noticed. I am greatly inspired by the quote of David Hum : " Beauty in things exists in the mind which contemplates them" Other artists i really admire or inspire me are painters like Marc Rothko and Gerard Richter. I also get a great deal of my inspiration from musicians like Nick Cave, Eddie Vedder and Tom Waits, lyrics and poems.

The last years i have been redirecting my focus on my own artistic work and specializing in analoge printing techniques and advanced  cyanotype printing. I worked days and nights at a time in the darkroom when i started out. The handcraft involved is what makes my images and prints my own and unique. I now combine digital techniques in capturing the image and creating the negative used to print the images. I prefer to work with my Hasseblad , scanning the images and processing and altering them digitally. This way i can combine modern and older techniques of photography. The prints i make are a one on one reproduction of the negative, so if the print is 70 cm x 100 cm, so is the negative. I work with handcrafted lightsenstive aquarelle paper which i expose in direct sunlight. Exposing the paper can take a long time depending on season and strength of the sun. There are other ways to accomplish exposure, like UV lights, but i embrace the uncertainty and uncontrollable factor of working with sunlight. The prints then get washed, bleached and toned. This can be done with arabic black tea, red wine, green leaves, etc The process of making one print can take up to 5 hours. Even though i offer the prints in edition, every print is an unique work of art and no print is exactly the same.