November 24, 2012
Painters Remko Koopman and Tamme de Boer, who cooperate under the name Booyabase, painted murals on four walls of a bridge in Zwolle in 2008, and last week they started on two new walls.
Trendbeheer’s Niels Post went to take a look and a lot of photos. He’s even got a couple of pics of the work in progress, even though that work in progress was halted due to “leaking porous asphalt”.
(Photo by Trendbeheer/NP, some rights reserved)
November 17, 2012
Sculptor Caspar Berger made a bronze self-portrait based on a 3D scan of his skull.
In this project, Self-portrait 21, the 3D copy of the skull represents the true image (vera icon). This image has formed the basis for a facial reconstruction by a forensic anthropologist, who received the skull anonymously accompanied only by the information that it belonged to a man in his mid-40s born in Western Europe.
If you want to see if the forensic anthropologist did a good job, here is a photo of Caspar.
(Photo: Caspar Berger. Link: Boing Boing.)
Tags: Caspar Berger, sculptor, sculpture, self-portraits
November 1, 2012
This week Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum launched an online database of 125,000 high resolution masterpieces called ‘Rijksstudio’ that can be downloaded and used for free. The images are copyright-free, and the idea is that you can make your own collection of images, post them to social media, caption them, make mouse pads out of them and all kinds of other creative stuff.
Rijksstudio was royally opened by Prince Constantijn and has a localized Pinterest feel to it.
(Link: www.limburger.nl)
Tags: Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum
October 25, 2012
Wouter Sieuwerts came up with this life size toy for his graduation from the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague.
It can be wound up, after which it can be made to move. There is a video that shows how this works at Vimeo. Sieuwerts writes: “It won’t go far and it won’t go fast, but it is very dynamic and exciting. I tried to make it look like a cross between an animal and a machine.”
The toy is called Erik, perhaps because of its bug like features? (Eric in the Land of the Insects is a classic Dutch novel by author Godfried Bomans.)
(Photo: Wouter Sieuwerts. Link: Bright.)
Tags: bugs, machines, toys, Wouter Sieuwerts
October 24, 2012
About 150 of the 200 pointe shoes of the Introdans dance company in Arnhem have been chewed up by mealworms. The mealworms apparently got into the glue that holds the point part of the shoe together, which probably happened during a supplier’s shipment from somewhere like Russia, France, the UK or the US. Just a few mealworms can easily plague a whole lot of shoes.
A spokesperson for the dance company estimated the damage at 10,000 euro for which they are not insured. Apparently other Dutch dance companies are checking their shoes out now as well just in case.
(Links: www.gelderlander.nl, www.nu.nl, Photo of Ballet shoes by craiglea123, some rights reserved)
October 23, 2012
By now the art world has heard of the seven works of art stolen from the Kunsthal museum in Rotterdam on 16 October, which included works by Picasso, Monet, Henri Matisse, Paul Gauguin, Lucian Freud and Meyer de Haan. It took the thieves just two minutes to get the paintings and drive off.
Although they might have had some inside help, the thieves simply made sure that a piece of plastic was jammed between the doorpost and the door, making it look like the door was also locked. Normally, the doors are electronically locked until the alarm is deactivated. Once the alarm is activated, the doors unlock.
Insert face palm.
Earlier this year two visitors were stuck in the museum after closing time because security guards had not noticed them. The room they were in was the same room as the one were the paintings were stolen. The visitors left through the emergency exit, and it took the guards 10 minutes to notice it.
Museum director Emily Ansenk claiming the system is ‘state of the art’ in the media sounds like a communist quoting the party line. Dutch news site NOS qualified her statement as ‘utter nonsense’ . To make things even more embarrassing, the Kunsthal has placed large flower pots around the museum so no one can easily park a getaway car right outside it.
To quote an art restorer friend of mine: “I can sleep soundly at night knowing that the Netherlands’ cultural property is now being protected by flower pots.”
(Links: www.nrc.nl, www.businessweek.com, Photo of locked door by boetter, some rights reserved)
October 22, 2012
Trendbeheer’s Niels Post got a sneak preview last week of the KBTR book, a photo book of Utrecht’s best known graffiti artist.
The 160-page full-colour book will be published in a limited edition of 1,000 copies and will only be sold at The Revenge in Utrecht as of 27 October. Price: 45 euro. Says the official announcement: “The publication is not a historical work of reference, but an autonomous art project.”
See also: Utrecht graffiti artist KBTR, the new Keith Haring?
(Photo by Trendbeheer/NP, some rights reserved)
Tags: graffiti, KBTR, street art, Trendbeheer, Utrecht
October 15, 2012
Four young painters were presented with the Royal Award for Modern Painting last Friday by Queen Beatrix at the royal palace in Amsterdam: Frank Ammerlaan, Jasper Hagenaar, Keetje Mans and Evi Vingerling (illustration, left to right).
The annual award was instituted in 1871 by King Willem III. It consists of a 6,500 euro prize (after taxes). The exhibition of the nominated paintings will run until November 5.
Trendbeheer went and rubbed shoulders with the winners at the palace. Jeroen Bosch’s conclusion: “The lion’s share is traditional, thoroughbred art, i.e. big, using paint, and depicting something.”
Tags: modern art, painters, painting, royal palaces
October 2, 2012
Controversial artist Tinkebelle (aka Katinka Simonse) has done it again: she’s collected some 1,000 live snails and glued colourful buttons and beads on their shells, which will be part of an exhibition opening this Thursday about animals at the VillaZebra children’s museum in Rotterdam. The usual animal groups are of course very upset. I’m surprised the museum is all cool with this and I wonder what parents are going to tell their kids.
The idea is that by turning the snail shells into artworks, the artist makes the snails special and even gives them personality. That is her explanation. Last year we had the hamsters going round and round for hours in balls that was judged OK after all by the courts, and then there’s always the famous cat hand bag she made that went viral.
From 2010, here’s a video with English subtitles about why she killed her own cat (and didn’t let the vet do it) and more.
I’m not a fan, but she really knows how to get people’s attention.
(Link: www.rnw.nl, Photo of Snails by davepatten, some rights reserved)
September 30, 2012
Artist and inventor Dave Hakkens was fascinated by the fact that porcelain shrinks when you bake it. He used that notion to create a series of jugs where each jug formed the basis of a cast for the next one.
Starting out with a 5 litre jug he ended up with 14 jugs, of which the smallest has a volume of 10 millilitres. The jugs are for sale.
See also: Two inventions—a charger in a safe, and a power strip in a book (and a bonus invention)
(Link: Bright. Photo: Dave Hakkens)
Tags: Dave Hakkens, jugs, porcelain
