The term 'Friendly hands' comes from Louise Bourgeois. She created many artworks in which hands played the leading role. For her, hands were the symbol of human interaction and communication, of human connection, vulnerability and strength. I found the clippings of the bright red hands surrounding this work in a magazine. They come from her beautiful artwork '10 am is When You Come to Me' which consists of 20 hand-painted sheets of music score paper with images of her hands and those of her assistant.
Central to this work is nature. A place without human interaction, to come to yourself. The leaf with a beautiful grain comes from our lime tree. This tree is huge. It is close to our house. Every year it hangs completely full of clusters of yellow-white flowers. The flowers grow together with a tongue-shaped pale green bract. That is the leaf in this work.
The little red balls are the fruits of the lime tree. These are originally green. I gave them a lick of red acrylic paint. So Louise Bourgeois' beautiful red plays a leading role in this work. I matched my acrylic paint to this bright red of Bourgeois.
Since about 1974, I have been involved almost daily in photography, drawing (charcoal, graphite, conté, chalk, ink), painting, watercolour and/or collage making. In all these branches of visual work, I have tried a lot, found my own way, but.. Read more…