Ans Wortel

Ans (Anna Maria) Wortel 1929 - 1996 ) was a Dutch painter, poet and writer. She made gouaches and oil paintings, aquarelles, drawings, collages, lithographs, etchings, sculptures and glass sculptures. She was an autodidact and has won the first prize at the biennale of Paris in 1963. She was one of the leading female artists of postwar Dutch modern art.Wortel’s work is strongly autobiographical. Her experiences as a girl, woman, mother and as an artist were mainly the source of her inspiration. Common themes are human emotions, love, relationships, mother/child relations and social criticism.
Up until the late 1950s there was a search for a personal style. Artwork from that time varies and shows characteristics of different artists, such as Katsushika Hokusai, Willem de Kooning, Marc Chagall, Pablo Picasso, Wifredo Lam and Karel Appel. In the late 1950s her artistic style eventually flows into her very own style which is best described as abstract figurative art. It often consists of naked woman, man or child figures, sometimes recognizable, but always deformed. These human figures are together, search each other, embrace each other or repel each other. The figures are in unspecified spaces. The moon, the sun and the contours of earth often recur in her work. Mostly her work is accompanied by handwritten poetical lines.Wikipedia

Jan Nieuwenhuys - CoBrA - European avant-garde art movement in 20th century

"The Dutch painter Jan Nieuwenhuijs is probably the most mysterious artist of the European CoBrA movement. He was one of the early active founders of the Dutch ‘Experimentele groep’ that later became part of CoBrA.
He and his brother Constant had lots of arguments about his paintings. During the war Constant himself painted only, catholic scenes like piatas and Maria portraits or still lifeas and thought that Jan chose his subjects too lightly.
In 1948 Appel, Elburg, Kouwenaar, Wolvekamp, Corneille, Constant, Brands, Rooskens and Jan Nieuwenhuijs founded the ‘experimentele groep’ that a few months later became the European group CoBrA. Jan was in his paintings of this period influenced by dreams, childrenas drawings, the artistic expressions of mentally handicapped people and primitive art. Animals such as birds and cats play a leading role in most of his works, along with fantastic creatures and beings that are made up of a combination of human, animal and mechanical elements. A lot of the creatures balance on a rope or wear boats as a hat.an was soon disappointed in the members of the CoBrA group, some of them were more interested in fame than being an activist , he couldnat stand the fighting that was going on between the members and so he left the group in the middle of 1949, some other members also left but they joined again, for the great exhibition in the Stedelijk Museum...
Jan went his own way, desillusioned, and concentrated only on his work. His paintings became more and more liberated and he experimented with different materials like fluorescent paint and everything he could get his hands on. Everything could become a painting.In an interview from 1964 he says; a.I start with my material and my color. With that I express myself. From the material I come to my subject and that is maybe contrary to what painters did in earlier days. I paint the way I write, the way I laugh. Thatas why I paint differently all the time, because my moods change. Thatas the way I feel.As a painter I donat want to paint a particular situation. I am not abstract, not really non-figurative. I try to be expressive and therefore I need certain images. Today I am in China, tomorrow in Paris, after tomorrow some other place. We are confronted every day with what happens in the world. Youâ re living on a specific spot, but also in the whole world. Itâs maybe therefore that we become so ignorant and hard, because we experience too much. Hunger, war. That particular situation doesnat mean anything anymore.’(jannieuwenhuys.com)

Avant Garde Art 

COBRA avant-garde art Eugène Brands

Eugène Brands (January 15, 1913 - January 15, 2002 in Amsterdam) was a Dutch painter, an early member of the COBRA avant-garde art movement.
In 1946, Eugène Brands participated in the group exhibition "Young Painters" in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, where a whole room was filled with his work. In 1948 he joined the Experimental Group Holland, and in November 1949 he showcased his artwork in the "International exhibition of experimental art". Meanwhile, the Experimental Group became one of the founders of the Cobra movement,and he was one of the artists contributing to the founding statement in the group's art magazine Reflex.However, differences of opinion and disagreements resulted in his departure and he decided to go solo. In the 1950s he was inspired by children's drawings.
Today his work is often showcased at the Museum Jan van der Togt.Wikipedia

 

David van de Kop

David Johannes van de Kop or David Vandekop (The Hague, November 3, 1937 - Dreischor, September 14, 1994) was a Dutch painter, draftsman and sculptor
Following his mentor Carel Visser, in his early work Van de Kop worked in steel in a constructivist style. He named this kind of work "framework conditions". In the 1970s he came into prominence with this work. He increasingly started to work with clay, from which he made large ceramic sculptures in bright colors. The great plasticity of clay gave him the opportunity to give more playful, more intuitive and more organic form. These works are usually made up of several parts, put together after baking became the bigger picture.
In later years, Van der Kop worked with more rough-cut wood and made "stacks" of different materials and debris, which he also colorfully painted. Sources of inspiration for him included the Greek mythology (Leda with the Swan, Danae, Eros, Dionysos), Magdalena and the Zeeland landscape.Wikipedia

Avant-garde artist Jan Nieuwenhuys

Jan Nieuwenhuys (January 8, 1922 – December 28, 1986) was a Dutch painter and one of the early active founders of the Dutch Experimentalists group (Reflex) that later became part of CoBrA.Around the age of 14, Nieuwenhuys and his two-year older brother decided to become painters. From 1938 to 1941 he attended the Rijksnormaalschool in Amsterdam. Later in the Second World War he also took lessons at the Rijksacademie in Amsterdam. At the Rijksacademie he met Karel Appel and Corneille.
During World War II Nieuwenhuys painted almost only clowns, nudes and couples making love. Just after the war he started painting fantasy animals like aggressive cocks, cats and bulls. He and his brother Constant had many arguments about his paintings. During the war Constant himself painted only Catholic scenes like Pietà and Maria portraits or still lifes and thought that Nieuwenhuys chose his subjects too lightly.

 In 1948 Appel, Elburg, Kouwenaar, Wolvekamp, Corneille, Constant Nieuwenhuys, Brands, Rooskens and Nieuwenhuys founded the Experimentele Groep in Holland that a few months later became the European group CoBrA. Jan was in his paintings of this period influenced by dreams, children's drawings, the artistic expressions of mentally handicapped people and primitive art. Animals such as birds and cats play a leading role in most of his works, along with fantastic creatures and beings that are made up of a combination of human, animal and mechanical elements. A lot of the creatures balance on a rope or wear boats as a hat.

 Nieuwenhuys was soon disappointed in the members of the CoBrA group, some of them were more interested in fame than being an activist. He could not stand the fighting that was going on between the members and so he left the group in the middle of 1949. Some other members also left, but they later rejoined for the great exhibition in the Stedelijk Museum.
In 1964 he said in an interview: "The group was not founded as an exposition group but as a group of activists. We wanted to put an effort into that, to fight against the softness in art at the time and using our imagination to change that. Regrettably I must ascertain that many of the Experimentalists of that day also became esthetics. Everything official stops to be combatant. I think that work of some of them look very dormant these days".
Nieuwenhuys later concentrated only on his work. His paintings became more and more liberated and he experimented with different materials like fluorescent paint and everything he could get his hands on. Everything could become a painting.
In an interview from 1964 he said: "I start with my material and my color. With that I express myself. From the material I come to my subject and that is maybe contrary to what painters did in earlier days. I paint the way I write, the way I laugh. That is why I paint differently all the time, because my moods change. That’s the way I feel."

 "As a painter I don’t want to paint a particular situation. I am not abstract, not really non-figurative. I try to be expressive and therefore I need certain images. Today I am in China, tomorrow in Paris, after tomorrow some other place. We are confronted every day with what happens in the world. You’re living on a specific spot, but also in the whole world. It’s maybe therefore that we become so ignorant and hard, because we experience too much. Hunger, war. That particular situation doesn’t mean anything anymore."
From the same interview: "I wish, if they see my work later on, that they can see the twentieth century. The artist must give his time a suit. And it doesn’t matter if he is an architect, poet or painter. In abstract painting I miss the beat of this time, the rudeness. We, the people of today we are living with the fear of an atom bomb. The abstracts are building only a superficial world for you."
He died in Amsterdam in 1986.Wikipedia