During an internship with the artist Frouwkje Smit in 2013 I was
asked to paint a mural. It was to be made on an exterior wall of
the Noorderparkkamer foundation in Amsterdam. The building
situated in the Noorderpark was a nursery for new artists. I
immediately accepted this big commission, which was to be on a
wall seven meters long. The only caveat was that the mural should
reflect the ‘artists nursery’ nature of the building. I began to
sketch out various ideas which would be presented to the
clients.
Things didn’t go as planned. On the day
of my presentation, as I was walking through the park, sketches in
hand, I was stopped by a group of men and women. “What are you
doing here, what are those drawings?” They made it clear that I
was on their territory. The fact that it was eleven in the morning
and they had half empty bottles of beer made it apparent that I
was dealing with people on the edges of society.
This episode made me approach the mural painting in a different
way. I ditched the sketches and decided on a concept that would
involve the people I’d met in the park. I painted a large eye
which looked in, as it were, on the activities within the
building. The background would be painted by my new
acquaintances.
In the days that followed we
talked, drank coffee and a relationship developed where my ideas
were accepted. Even so I chose to leave their ‘territory’ by five
o’clock every evening. Because at this point they would at least
all have drunk over ten beers.
The day that we
were to paint the background of the mural a festival was going on
in the park. I gave brushes out and without too much discussion we
all got to work applying the paints I had selected. After a half
hour or so we stood back to view our work. “I don’t think that was
the idea” someone said, “Nope” I agreed. The background had become
a collection of fairly aggressive texts, unpleasant to read. By
this time the evening light was fading and my assistants were
drinking heavily. Someone suggested using rollers to overlay the
background colours, “perfect, lets do it” I said, and so we set to
it as the light dimmed. Someone else suggested spattering white
paint as a finishing touch, so that was done as well, but by this
time it was too dark to see the result, that would have to be the
surprise for the next day.
The following morning looking through the sunbeams I contemplated a surprisingly nice mural with overlapping colours that harmonised with the natural surroundings. This first commission, the meeting with the people in the park and collaborating with them have had a lasting influence on me and my subsequent artistic work.
