It was about a year ago that I started flashing away when taking pictures. That of course is not a good idea at an artshow. Therefor this gallerist got kind pissed off.

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Anyhow, I want to keep it short because the painting and me aren’t friends yet.

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It’s colorful but I don’t like the colors, they seem to miss complexity. Than, what the colors miss on complexity, the compotition makes up for. Beeing a total ballbreaker. Okay, there I’m proud of but why can’t I like them both?

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I figure that will need some time.

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Ow, If you are wondering why on the painting this guy doesn’t look pissed. I didn’t want to show this guy like that since it was my fault that he acted like he drank a bucket of piss anyways.

How come that something that I don’t even recognize as having made myself is so popular? When posting on Facebook that I was selling out paintings, most reactions came for this one. Leaving a big questionmark above my head.

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The first who asked for this painting was Amarins. So she got it.

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Now it is where a painting belongs. On a white wall, above a couch in between other art and some nice lighting where people can enjoy it.

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Now I found out that selling paintings is also a nice way to get an insight in other peoples livingspace.

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Thanks Amarins! (still think you have a strange name, makes me think of a wierd fruit since it sounds like ‘tamarin’)

Meet Michelle, almost 2 years old and the punkest kid I know. Complete with attitude at first sight but behind that is the sweetest human you can think of. Here, I revealed the secret of punks.

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With my homies I often have discussions about taking pictures of people without asking, in this case I asked her mom but for instance in a train I rather be rude and shoot away at fellow-travellers (example) or fellow people in public space in general (example). Still I don’t think it’s rude. Sure, it may confront people with the fact that they are visible and in a certain way even interestin. But a reason to get angry?

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These two pictures visualize very well what happens if I take a photo of someone without asking. First (left picture) there is the person’s attitude, showing it’s character, the primary reaction to interaction when it is still unclear if it is safe or not. The second (right picture) it becomes clear that it is safe, the natural expression is transformed in the easthetical, contious reaction. The way you want to be seen.

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Well, I like to capture the first reaction. It would be kind of hard to get that if I’d ask for permission to shoot, wouldn’t it?

Lacking good words I’ll say that I can’t wait to see this in paint. Okay, it’s a lot of emptynes and grey.

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But on the same time its got a lot of different lights, a wide range of subtile colors and lines, whatever I am supposed to mean with that.

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And it makes me think of Gerhard Richter.

While a lot of people have already asked me if I’m aware of the fact that this may make people think it is a Mondrian rip off, I am happy to be back into applying de Stijl to my work. This is my main concern in painting, it is a language I am trying to learn.

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After finishing this I have the exact feeling that I now know the answer of the question: why do I like the picture that I bought at the fleamarket in Berlin. Why did I pick this picture, among others, from a box with hundreds of pictures? Of course I could have explained this verbally but it would miss that what it makes it an image. If you want to answer this question without translating it to letters and words, than de Stijl is the language to communicate in.

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Okay, the result is not the virtous picture with a shitload of expression or a deeper meaning and also not a social/politically engaged work. Now, it’s a reaction from itself about itself placing it somewhere in the universe.

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At this moment I’d better shut up.

When I took the picture it was because of the contrast of the young man tying his shoelaces against the background of cars moving by. I can remember liking the concentrated position and the colors of a moving BMW. Even though I generally find cars highly overrated in praktical way -I’d rather bicycle- when it comes to easthetics I find BMW’s pretty high on my list. It was in Berlin that I took this picture.

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Now it’s hanging in a kitchen, in Berlin, in between shelves with tea and breakfast and old Dutch communist party-posters providing a nice perspective on this picture. This kitchen is quite cozy, in fact the entire appartment is. It’s a little messy, a little improvised and everywhere is some kind of creative expression to be found.

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It’s the kitchen of my two friends. The past year this appartment has been my home-base in Berlin. When working and meeting there for Masta-magazine I would stay in the livingroom, cook a bit in this kitchen and have chats and beer with Joep and Julia, the residents of this appartment.

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This painting actually wasn’t sold, I gave it to them. Partly because I am greatfull for their hospitality and partly because I wanted to be part of their collection of creative expressions.

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Thanks for letting me hang there!

This is how the first painting I sold in years looks like in it’s final, well maybe not final, destination. Proud to be hanging in Bram and Lonja’s livingroom.

It is wellknow that most times a flash kills more than it adds to a photo. This picture was a great example for that.

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The picture I used was flashed straight in the face, resulting in this lady in a uniformlike costume without an expression. Her face plain white like a mask.

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Giving me the oppertunity to play around with a shitload of white paint. But on second hand, I think I should take it easy with the titaniumoxide.

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With the other paintings to not overdo it.

The title has come to this with a little help from a Mexican friend. I needed her imput because the subject of this portrait would sure give me a bitching if I used her widespread language improperly. Not sure if I did it right but at least now I can blame someone else.

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Okay, the little story that goes with the portrait. We were waiting for the bus out of Berlin, to Hamburg. It was midsummer, too hot to put in words, she had just gotten rid of her haste, after a busy weekend, by reaching the busstation on time leaving a small hour to catch up. Which was also short because I’d rather hang out with this hermosa for hours and days and weeks and stuff, but that on the side. In this short hour we got sushi, our usual communication problems, quality time, sunlight and the joy of being in eachothers’ presence on a brick wall that resembled a plant trough of which it’s content had become a symbol of faded glory. It was full of weeds yet on the flipside it could be said that nature had taken over, it has been said that I am an optimist.

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Anyhow. Aware of the growing urge to paint portraits I asked her if I could take a picture of her. She went shy, a feeling that I can understand since it resulted in a stereotypical romantic setting of a young man with crappy-ass analog Pentax taking a photo of a very elegant young lady, and thus I went shy as well. The picture ended up very good and I won’t start rambling about the beautifull light and all because I do that all the time. The only thing there was is that I totally forgot which film I used to get this result. It could be some film that makes soft colors but it could as well be a film that I deliberately put on right in the sunlight to mess it slightly up. Who knows.

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In the end I finished the last sushi and we walked to the bus. We hugged, threw her luggage in, hugged again and our hour was over. When I showed her the picture, I can recall her saying that she went a bit shy, this time I didn’t.

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I decided to make it in oil paint

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Not for sale

If Otto would be in his twenties right now, in Berlin where I bought this picture, he would be the boss of all hipsterparties.

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This because of his epic moustache. It is for this reason that I bought his portrait.

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I think he’s got a lot to thank his stache for. At least this painting.