Art has not just the capacity to
deliver clear messages, to build cool concepts; it also offers us the
possibility to enter the universe of a person. It has the universal power of
revelation, by transmitting to our subjectivity a feeling, a vision, a texture,
that we can connect to experience, changing our perception in a mysterious way
and making it something universal. Meeting Jaap de Vries in Breda was
definitely a mysterious and exciting experience for me.
I had seen some of Jaap’s work before
my visit, and they had appeared very dark and disturbing at first sight. I had
expected a very formal meeting that would contain a lot of technical details
about the show Alex, Richard and Adam were planning and maybe to meet a creepy
character. It turned out to be very different from what I had imagined.When we arrived Jaap immediately offered us a
couple of beers and showed us around his studio with such simplicity and
kindness. My guard dropped slightly, but as the tour continued to the basement,
I briefly toyed with the possibility of panic. His basement played home to more
pieces, installations, puppets, dolls and mannequins. The room was dark, there
was a table in the middle with a few empty bottles, some coloured lights. I had
the impression I was on the set of a horror movie but it was real. I had this
awkward impression of being in another dimension at the border of reality and
fiction.
We were all impressed by the quantity
of his work, we could see piles and piles of paintings, and his first reaction
was to say, “ I hope there is enough to do a show!” I could feel the second I
entered this room that painting was a vital and exhausting process for him
because of the amount, but also by the presence of such personal details:
memories, photos, notes, books, cds, that were there to show his inspiration
and a strong connection to his own life. I started looking more carefully at
the paintings and it was the watercolours that really captured my attention.
Even in there beauty there was something that was broken, that was ambivalent,
that created a tension and pain in the beautiful face of that young girl. I
then glanced at the wall and saw a picture of her and Jaap explained that it
was his daughter.
As we all became more and more at ease
in his space, slowly getting to know each other, things began to change. There
was a terrified sculpture of a fat woman on her back looking up in horror, eyes
and teeth as white as white, the rest black, head to toe including face and
hair. The horror turned to comedy.
Jaap and I started discussing the idea
of an e-mail correspondence in order to clarify his approach in the most
natural way possible. These are some of the letters we wrote:
Dear Jaap,
It was a great privilege to meet you at your
studio and become acquainted with your work within its environment as it gave
me clearer focus on context and beginnings.
I am very much looking forward to
discussing your work with you. I find it very strong and it arouses many
questions.
You said to me that as an artist you
were interested in understanding how human beings are constructed. Although I
have the impression you are trying to show what human condition is, it does not
seem that you are trying to build a concept of it. In your work there is
nothing that is staged or too preconceived which means to provoke a specific
feeling or express a clear conception of reality that needs to be explained.
Your work has something fascinating within the darkness and cruelty apparent
throughout it, but there is a definite power. Whether one likes the work or
not, it is made of our drives and creates a physical feeling and approach.
Freud believed that human beings where driven by two conflicting desires: the
life drive and the death drive and we can very much feel the tension between
the two in some paintings. In your landscapes the representation of nature and
its elements can be linked to living life, but the placid atmosphere of
darkness that come out of these landscapes can characterize the desire to
return to inanimation and death.
Do the landscapes act to create a scene
that stage the world and thoughts you are provoking, or are you creating an
experience which is purposefully less personal and human?
All these remarks come from my first
impressions and I would like to know how you relate to them.
B
Hi B,
The first thing I noticed in your
letter is the use of abstract terms with ‘con’ (together) in it: concept,
condition, preconceive, constructed, conception….
Only one word opposes that: anatomy.
Anatomy is (as metaphysics is not) directly related to the human body, and the
only body of importance to us is the human body, and the awareness of death and
darkness that come with that. I’m happy you noticed that so well. I’m not
really sure about the meaning of the landscapes, but I guess they are kind of
crime scenes. Perhaps there only crime is, that they are there as the hole of
bodies that embody are bodies, so somehow we must relate to them.
Best,
Jaap.
Dear Jaap,
Today my approach is different and less
intellectual, my aim is to understand why some people can reject your paintings
because they say they feel a negative energy that seems to destroy the power in
them to produce an emotion or attraction.
How do you explain some people have
refused to penetrate in your universe because of it’s darkness, because they
can only see something that only brings bad sensations they want to avoid? How
do you explain this blockage?
The presence of death is unavoidable in
your work and for a reason because our whole existence is oriented by that
reality in a way, but what can save men from desperation?
I know you don’t believe in god but do
you believe in something?
B
Dear B,
About the reaction you mentioned of
people who “refuse to penetrate in your universe because of its darkness.” I
think we live in a world of (ab)negation and therefore we think we can protect
ourselves by avoiding certain thoughts or certain aspects we feel are a threat.
“Because they can only see something that only brings bad sensations they want
to avoid when they look at it.” I do think it’s a dangerous attitude to life;
it’s not realistic and makes one very vulnerable. Let’s not forget that the
holy bible is full of misdemeanour of mankind. I might not believe in a god,
because I think we can’t accept the fact that we re part of evolution, so we
very much need myths to justify our existence, I do believe the holy bible
contains very much the truth, although it did not happen for real.
“It’s a truth but it did not happen for
real.” That might be crucial for art as well. It’s our privilege to think (like
you do) and to paint (like I do) about the things in life we want to think
about, without censoring ourselves. In doing so we can reveal a truth but at
the same time the context is very different from reality. The revealing of
man’s cruelty, like Pier Paolo Pasolini did in Salo, 120 days of Sodom doesn’t make him a criminal at all, he’s a
poet, but he reveals an awful truth, bearable by beauty. That makes it even
more confusing!!
Confusion
is very important according to Nietzsche; therefore masks are good items to
work with!
And Suspicion is also something we shouldn’t be afraid of!
I once experienced in my studio a man
who invited himself for a visit but wanted to leave the studio after five minutes,
because the watercolours disturb him very much. He stayed for more than two
ours, we talked and eventually he talked about the things that were triggered
by the watercolours. He thought he had them hidden them far away enough not to
have to deal with this past, but my watercolours wakened those “sleeping dogs”.
Afterwards I felt proud that we had some serious talks thanks to the
watercolours. And this happened several times, but most of those visitors left
with buying a work, he unfortunately didn’t (yet:-) Okay Charlotte it’s nice to
chat about art in this way. If you want I can send you some more thoughts about
painting this week. But we should explore as much common ground as possible;
otherwise it’s too much a one-man show!
Join this play, for me painting is
really much of a play, of putting two or three paint brushes together to create
an image, like the leaves of a tree (maybe that’s why I like to do the forest
so much).
Best!
Jaap
Hi B,
About cruelty, I find this time very
cruel according to bureaucracy and infantilism; I hate adults pretending to be
silly, like they do on television… Often people pretend they only want to do
good, but there is a perfect saying: There’s no worse treason than doing the
right thing for the wrong reason.
