In the September 2004 my mother passed away at the age of 69 after an eight year battle with breast cancer.
Just days before she died, my father was diagnosed with bladder cancer. He passed away in April 2006 at the age of 71, barely a year and a half after my mother.
In May 2004, I had quit my permanent job and now had the time to spend some quality time with my parents.
Aside from several very special month-long visits with my father in the Netherlands, we had daily contact through the internet. In spite of the physical distance, I could see him every day.
It is the emotional roller coaster that became my parent’s life as well as mine during their illness and after their death, which I have tried to depict in this series.
It is a series I struggled with more than usual, because of its emotional load. I needed to find ways to portray their struggles, their ups and downs, as well as my own, their attempt to die with dignity, my own mortality and the mixed emotions that come with this topic.
Usually I paint with a clear idea of what I would like to achieve. In my “portrait” series, for example, I had chosen to paint a particular person for each painting. This series I approached more instinctively. I worked with words, with feelings only. I realized that it is not always necessary to have a completely worked out concept. It was important for me to let my emotions go. It took me more than 6 months after my father passed away to begin painting again and even then it was a sensitive process. The perplexity is clearly visible in this series of paintings.
I have purposely given the works short, one or two word titles, such as Dignity, Blue, Simplicity, Connection, Eager, Humble, Distress, Ferocious, Affections. These are the words, the emotions, the feelings that I worked with when I painted the series. They are key-words that attempt to describe the emotional mix, as well as leave room for the viewers own interpretation. “Blue”, for example, can mean blue as in “the blues, feeling blue”, but the colour blue is also often associated with depth and stability, it represents knowledge, power, integrity, and seriousness.
These various aspects of each painting, is what makes them rather complex, even in its sometimes perceived simplicity. It is up to you, the viewer to take each painting into your own world.
I also purposely have not elaborated more on the choice of words for each painting. Because of the “rawness” of the emotions, I would like every painting to speak to each individual. We all have associations with certain words, with certain colours, with certain paintings.
The works vary from grey tone paintings to vibrant, colourful works. From simplicity to dramatic and complex emotions. You will see paint thrown on to the canvas to demonstrate disbelief. On the other hand; there is always light on the other side of the tunnel… Every one deals with life, love, death and grief differently. I would like to stir up a mixture of emotions in my audience.
My choice for a dancer and a violinist to improvise their individual art forms at the opening stems from that same idea of looking for raw emotion.
Nicole Koebel will literally have her emotional response to a painting determine how to depict that in her abstract, contemporary dance. Violinist George Andrix will do exactly the same in his performance. Their interpretations of the same painting might sometimes clash, they may feed off each other, influence each other, disagree with each other! The violin and dance may at times be in perfect sync together, but they might also each venture in their own direction.
As audience you may at times feel uncomfortable at an emotion heard or seen in their interpretation. Their performance may also compel you to take a closer look at a work you had earlier dismissed.
