VERVOLG INTERVIEW ( op virtueel) UNDERGROUND MAGAZINE NEW YORK :
Influences
‘Obviously, I am attracted by (connected to) painters or other artists who are my “Art soul mates”, “the damaged ones”. I am very fascinated by the works of Joseph Beuys who has put his war traumas and solutions in his huge searching project during his art career. Throughout his artistic movements he collected all kinds of material. He made several special tracks, compositions or poetry, in combination with his free attitude toward art (everybody is an artist, he said). This search can be reflected on the life events he went through, surviving them and the new way you can look at life when you rise above it.
‘The works of Francis Bacon I also admire. I see his hidden youth conflicts, or his expression of his homosexuality and the men he loved. He transformed his images in a sometimes brutal, hard or raw beautiful form. Willem de Koonink captures things with wildness and at the same time he uses special vulnerable colours (which are also a symbolic expression for our emotions) and lightness in his expression. I love Giagometti’s gift of showing human vulnerability and relativity.
‘Perl Perlmuter inspires me by her rough organic and balanced sculptures. Egon Schiele goes with his paintings and drawings, like nobody else, to the erotic and lonely roots that mankind can express. I also enjoy the thick, bulging and lonely expression of Edward Hopper. In the paintings of Frida Kalho I do see a lot of pain one suffers when your soul is damaged and therefore vulnerable. Her symbolic expression probably has kept her in a certain balance and I know she did create out of the dark part of her soul. The way she uses symbolism betrays her emotions of sorrow.
‘Frida Kahlo also used a strong archetype Mexican way of expressing herself in her work. At the same time, I recognise my own symbolism in her work. I see emotions of suffering, loneliness, anger, longings, admiration and the distance one experiences with the other when life gives you a damaged vulnerability. Because I also create out of the dark parts of my soul and are able to express the archetype way I see the analogous ‘language’ of other painters who work within the same structure.´
My way of working
‘To avoid any diversion I work alone. Particular music (Flamenco, Fado or Balkan tunes) stimulates my working. When I am working with abstraction, there is no preconceived plan. The structure has a central place. I look intuitively for motives that move me. Sometimes, the canvas is being held underneath the water taps and there is a lot of scratching in the beginning when I search for my interpretation of beauty and its vulnerability.
‘The unpolished, the damaged, the faultiness, the crumpled has my affinity. In my head there is a dark war going on, which of course is related to my own small neuroses and too many traumatic experiences. I‘ve been confronted with several psychopathic behaviours of others. They influenced my constitution for the rest of my life, of course. The only way I can defeat my traumatic experiences is to yield them. I paint or draw them, wear black clothes, paint my eyes black and stay in contact with my authentic self. However, my traumatic history has changed me forever.
‘In 2003, I worked with mixed materials like ropes, nets, felt and so on. The colours red, orange and pink return in several paintings and there is a bright yellow surrounding in my work, a temporary favorite. In 2004, dark horizons are familiar. These helped me to turn the images in sharper shapes. At the end of 2005, sadly enough my fathers suddenly died and I stopped painting for a while. After this period of mourning, my work became more surrealistic and is always setup in a black dark surrounding. Red still is a dominant colour. From here I start to work in a different way. First the images arise in my head. They are drawn on paper and worked out with paint and oil crayons. The themes are always personal or inspired by the repressed hidden part of my soul.Since 2008 I started drawing in my bed; before or after my sleep.I love these intuitive beddrawings.
Influences
‘Obviously, I am attracted by (connected to) painters or other artists who are my “Art soul mates”, “the damaged ones”. I am very fascinated by the works of Joseph Beuys who has put his war traumas and solutions in his huge searching project during his art career. Throughout his artistic movements he collected all kinds of material. He made several special tracks, compositions or poetry, in combination with his free attitude toward art (everybody is an artist, he said). This search can be reflected on the life events he went through, surviving them and the new way you can look at life when you rise above it.
‘The works of Francis Bacon I also admire. I see his hidden youth conflicts, or his expression of his homosexuality and the men he loved. He transformed his images in a sometimes brutal, hard or raw beautiful form. Willem de Koonink captures things with wildness and at the same time he uses special vulnerable colours (which are also a symbolic expression for our emotions) and lightness in his expression. I love Giagometti’s gift of showing human vulnerability and relativity.
‘Perl Perlmuter inspires me by her rough organic and balanced sculptures. Egon Schiele goes with his paintings and drawings, like nobody else, to the erotic and lonely roots that mankind can express. I also enjoy the thick, bulging and lonely expression of Edward Hopper. In the paintings of Frida Kalho I do see a lot of pain one suffers when your soul is damaged and therefore vulnerable. Her symbolic expression probably has kept her in a certain balance and I know she did create out of the dark part of her soul. The way she uses symbolism betrays her emotions of sorrow.
‘Frida Kahlo also used a strong archetype Mexican way of expressing herself in her work. At the same time, I recognise my own symbolism in her work. I see emotions of suffering, loneliness, anger, longings, admiration and the distance one experiences with the other when life gives you a damaged vulnerability. Because I also create out of the dark parts of my soul and are able to express the archetype way I see the analogous ‘language’ of other painters who work within the same structure.´
My way of working
‘To avoid any diversion I work alone. Particular music (Flamenco, Fado or Balkan tunes) stimulates my working. When I am working with abstraction, there is no preconceived plan. The structure has a central place. I look intuitively for motives that move me. Sometimes, the canvas is being held underneath the water taps and there is a lot of scratching in the beginning when I search for my interpretation of beauty and its vulnerability.
‘The unpolished, the damaged, the faultiness, the crumpled has my affinity. In my head there is a dark war going on, which of course is related to my own small neuroses and too many traumatic experiences. I‘ve been confronted with several psychopathic behaviours of others. They influenced my constitution for the rest of my life, of course. The only way I can defeat my traumatic experiences is to yield them. I paint or draw them, wear black clothes, paint my eyes black and stay in contact with my authentic self. However, my traumatic history has changed me forever.
‘In 2003, I worked with mixed materials like ropes, nets, felt and so on. The colours red, orange and pink return in several paintings and there is a bright yellow surrounding in my work, a temporary favorite. In 2004, dark horizons are familiar. These helped me to turn the images in sharper shapes. At the end of 2005, sadly enough my fathers suddenly died and I stopped painting for a while. After this period of mourning, my work became more surrealistic and is always setup in a black dark surrounding. Red still is a dominant colour. From here I start to work in a different way. First the images arise in my head. They are drawn on paper and worked out with paint and oil crayons. The themes are always personal or inspired by the repressed hidden part of my soul.Since 2008 I started drawing in my bed; before or after my sleep.I love these intuitive beddrawings.
In the end of 2010 I 've started the Sketchbookproject .In this fantastic sketchbook project you'll see parts of my creative behaviour.(A link of this project is due on Jan.2011)
My vision
‘Anything a human being does or does not, every track a human being leaves behind, tells us something about his or her emotional (sub-conscious) background. When you translate this into the expressiveness of art, you get involved into either the archaistic or the psycho-analytical way of perception. By manufacturing abstract works (associative action painting), I get into an associative interaction with myself. The sensory perception is an important factor in this, like playing with materials. By acting, I touch an “underground” level in myself, “my personal and also universal underworld” which is connected with deeper parts of life. Also my open, creative mind brings me to universal (archetype) symbolism. By creating, both in language and image, I get into balance. It all results in more grip and ‘eagerness’ for this life.´
Johan Peters
My vision
‘Anything a human being does or does not, every track a human being leaves behind, tells us something about his or her emotional (sub-conscious) background. When you translate this into the expressiveness of art, you get involved into either the archaistic or the psycho-analytical way of perception. By manufacturing abstract works (associative action painting), I get into an associative interaction with myself. The sensory perception is an important factor in this, like playing with materials. By acting, I touch an “underground” level in myself, “my personal and also universal underworld” which is connected with deeper parts of life. Also my open, creative mind brings me to universal (archetype) symbolism. By creating, both in language and image, I get into balance. It all results in more grip and ‘eagerness’ for this life.´
Johan Peters
Freelance journalist.