I am going to finish my Dutch Sojourn now - having given you my bird's art view of Amsterdam, Kröller-Müller and Westhoven over the last few weeks. Being in Holland, my unspellable unpronouncable maiden name V L I E T S T R A was just another familiar surname and there are loads of names ending in "stra" with origins in Friesland. My great great grandfather Andries Klaasen Vlietstra was granted his surname in 1811 (see the previous blogs 15th May and 16th May 2012) and I enlarged the photocopy … [Read more...]
Fantasy Trees
I painted this tree sitting in the Kröller-Müller Sculpture Woodland.What bliss to be in such a lovely place doing what I enjoy the most It will be a nice addition to the one I painted in Singapore called The Petrified Forest. … [Read more...]
Jean Debuffet’s Jardin d’Email
...and suddenly you see this fantasy. with a really wacky tree on top... so you go into the little door and up some narrow spiral stairs and you are in this other-world. It's a bit like The Magic Faraway Tree which we loved as kids. Every contour is outlined and there are often whole school groups running around this weird landscape, screaming in delight. This has to be one of my all time favourites! So I spent a couple of hours painting it. Another lovely day in … [Read more...]
An Amusement
I've put these portraits (portraits ?) by Jan Fabre on my blog to amuse my son. They were on plinths in the woodlands at the Kröller-Müller Museum and they certainly made me smile. It's Fabre's Hoofdstuk series. Hoofdstuk means "chapter" but it doesn't really translate because in Dutch it's a pun meaning Chapter or "Head Piece". I like the very distinguished Warthog one. … [Read more...]
A walk in the Sculpture Garden
Step out of the doors of the Kröller-Müller Museum near Arnhem and suddenly you'll find yourself in good company alongside Rodin's Femme Accroupie -1882, Moore's Two-piece reclining figure II (1960), and Barbara Hepworth's sculptures in the Gerrit Rietveld pavilion - woh! This is in a garden which merges into a woodland. A swan is floating serenely...Marta Pan's Sculpture Flottante 1961 and you may stumble into a meeting where everyone is standing aorund being briefed by the head honcho - … [Read more...]