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Techniques
Nowadays I work in a mix of all felting techniques.
So I use wet feltmaking techniques (with water and soap) as well as the dry techniques (barbed needles).
With the punch machine I blend thin fabrics with wool. It’s this material that I apply in my sculptures.
When I want to make 3-D works, I’ll resort to felting needles and I’ll shape manually.
The finest thing in felting is, that I don’t need glue anymore. The longer you process the fibers, the tighter your work will become.
This way I will preserve the soft tactile of the fabric!

Subject
By shaping animals and human figures I’m able to tell my story.
The humans-and-animals subject as a fleeting creature is a recurrand theme in my work. At first glance my sculptures suggest a fairy story (also because I use pastel colors); but just like in a genuine fairy tale, they also show a dark side.

Project: ‘about elderly people’…. start 2008
In this work, I want to show the beauty of the old age.
The beauty of the wrinkle lines in a face and the traces that time left behind.
The project is made up of a variety of works:
portraits and panels with depictions of nude, elderly people;
a spacial work (‘GROOTJE’ [GRANNY]) and a film strip on the internet.

Portraits and panels
In 2008 I started making portraits in felting techniques.
They are no portraitures of existing people, but they depict elderly people in general.
Further I made 4 large draperies with on it depicted life-sized men and women.
We use to look in an uneasy way at these nude people.
And they look back uneasy too.

“Grootje” “Granny”
I made this performance in co-operation with mime player and singer Hilde Labadie.
GROOTJE/ GRANNY is an old lady, entirely made of wool. A felted fabric with depictions of birds is draped over her.
Hilde Labadie will take GRANNY sitting in a wheelchair out to various locations.
Moreover a film strip has been recorded, that can be viewed on YOUTUBE , the internet.

“Weemoed” “Melancholy”.
This project will represent the last part of my project: “About the elderly….”
It will consist of two portraits of a farmer and his wife.
Both portraits have the measure of 2 x 2 meters. All designed in black, grey and white, resembling large black ande white photographs.
The title refers to our melancholic feelings about the past, but also to te emotions of the two farmers. They are sitting deedless at the table.

Foto's