Just as earthly as elevated

​

create contemporary and minimalist sculptures with which I create peace, strength and joy. Balance for the world and for myself. Apparent simplicity, which does not lose its magic.

​

I look for shapes that feel right. Shapes that are just as earthly as elevated.

​

I name my sculptures, a title is restrictive for me. A name comes from your subconscious mind and is almost always appropriate. You feel it, but you cannot dissect it clinically. With everything in my life I notice that my subconscious mind and the symbolism associated with it plays a major role.

​

Another thing that often appears in my designs is a masculine energy that wants to manifest. An energy that stands for doing my own thing, being able to focus, putting something in the world and having a healthy self-esteem without having to be perfect… This is very liberating for me and gives me a lot of pleasure. Funny that afterwards I keep discovering that I also accidentally incorporated a feminine aspect into every creation, which confirms to me that you can never separate the truth from its specific context.

​

Before I started to make art, especially my feminine side was in the foreground. By making sculptures my masculine and feminine sides are in balance. That makes me a complete person.

​

Because I am 'different', or difficult to frame, -I have a character full of contradictions in all areas-, I know what it is like not to fit in and also how valuable it is to to feel the freedom that is necessary to take that freedom at a certain point in your life, to dare to be yourself. To feel equal, without having to be similar.

​

I am extremely grateful for the climate in the country where I live, where we have a lot of freedom. This gives you the opportunity to find your optimal happiness and functioning level. Suppression of race, gender, religion, sexuality, emotions and diversity… as a person and society you get a disproportionate amount of problems in return. So if there's one thing I want to plea for, except for balance, it’s for freedom and equality.

​

The practical side

​

There are two kinds of sculptors; the vast majority of them chop away, and work from the outside in, and you have the kind that builds up, which actually works from the inside out. I am a builder, and after sketching an idea I start with clay to complete the design. Then follows a full-size prototype of aerated concrete. I make a mold of silicones with a support cap of plaster reinforced with glass fibers. I cast the sculpture in an environmentally friendly acrylic resin, which I color through and through with pigments. Then the real work begins. Filing and sanding until the silhouette and light refraction are perfect from every angle. At that point the sculpture comes to life and then I choose the name.

 

The unique pieces, mainly wall sculptures, are made by hand without the use of a mould. The images that I do cast, I cast in a modest edition. An edition of 4, 6 or 8 pieces, each in its own color, so that each image is unique.

​

The birth of my sculptures

​

As a child, beauty could take my breath away. I wanted to grab it, collect it, do something with it. I had the feeling that it went in on one side and that it had to come out on the other, otherwise I would pop. For example, in the forest in the Dutch artist village Bergen where I grew up, I took beautiful things home with me, which invariably turned ugly when I took them out of context and then withered and lost their colors. Beauty was food for the soul, but also frustration. I was a sensitive girl with a strong will, who drew every day, invented a lot, undertook and organized a lot and liked to get dirty. At school, where a lot of time was spent on artistic development, it was invariably said that I would later become an artist.

​

The older I got, the more I learned to let go, and had to let go. And the more I let go, the more often beautiful things arose. Art was no longer what I came up with, but what just came from within. Any other work I did took a lot of energie, but creating art just enriched my energy. From room and relaxation I naturally arrive at that vibrant mystery where my shapes come from. It is such a funny experience to see images come up like the bubbles in my champagne. I just "swipe" through my mind until I see and taste a shape that is right and tasty. And then it is very cool to notice that a strong, own signature is rolling out there. Then comes the creative process, which is wonderfully technical, practical and physical. But if you ask about the idea behind my art, then I have to remain liable for the answer. An idea is what you come up with. My art comes from my subconscious mind. My art, that’s me.

​

Beauty no longer houses impossibility, but is now a free form of happiness that makes me a whole person.

​

What brought me here

​

• My great love and observant eye for beauty. And at the same time my deep dislike for clutter.

• The power that drives me to develop myself positively by always questioning myself and the world with curiosity and doing something with it.

• After a creative and enterprising youth, having made a career choice that brought me nothing, over the years I experimented in different art fields and found my true essence in creating sculptures.

• My path of life: a warm and alternative home, growing up on the Oude Hof in Bergen, a wild childhood, a neat gray job, two beautiful children, a divorce, a great love and his death. All of this has helped me to get where I am now starting: with a new great love at my side, finally giving myself and my art the right to exist.                                                                                                                                                                                                    

 

(Start artist practice, October 2020)