Eva Lansink, a burgeoning contemporary artist based in Leiden, the Netherlands, possesses a unique skill set encompassing sculpture, graphic design, and photography. Her graduation masterpiece, DRIFT, comprised a collection of sculptures and etchings, accompanied by an art book. The story within explored an anthropomorphic realm where rabbits roamed free, unburdened by societal expectations, and fully embracing their fantasies without hesitation or guilt, challenging the receiver and observer alike.
In her latest photographic endeavor titled RAW, Lansink delves into the concept of raw love – an unbridled force guided solely by intuition and impulse. Her subjects are immersed in nature, unashamedly perverse and exhibitionistic.
The crux of Eva Lansink’s artistic expression lies in exposing the animalistic facets of human character, typically subdued to conform to societal norms. Through her work, she offers a glimpse into a world that exists beyond our mundane reality – one where our desires and needs can be indulged anonymously, free from the constraints of society.
www.ftn-books.com has t the DRIFT publication from an edition of 100 signed and numbered copies now available.
Rossi was born in Milan and began working for Ignazio Gardella and Marco Zanuso in 1956. From 1955 to 1964, he served as the editor-in-chief of Casaballa-Continuita. In 1966, he authored the book “Architettura Della Città,” which became a bestseller and was translated into 8 languages. Rossi also taught at the Polytechnic University in Zurich, Milan, Venice, and New York, and has been the director of the Venice Biennale since 1983.
He believes that it is impossible to think without a certain obsession. For him, that obsession consists of abstraction and reduction, two elements that can be found in all of his designs through their geometric simplicity. Rossi is known to us as the architect of the Bonnefant Museum in Maastricht.
Dieteren embodies the various hues of the painter’s urge. The lure of the paint, the seduction of form, drenched in a plethora of colors, all while never losing sight of unity in invention. All components of the work are interconnected and inextricably linked, with the focus on a cohesive whole. He gives this unity the space and time to “grow”, to evolve into a final masterpiece. His expressionistic yet introspective art is liberated from the obligation of fixating on overtly recognizable themes and motifs. The transitions of color can be sudden, sensual, or gradual, flowing into one another.
All of this creates a symphony, a harmony of paint and canvas, composition and content, and most importantly, plasticity and expressivity. Restrained yet effortlessly fluid, spontaneous, seemingly naive but deeply calculated and conscious. Dieteren’s body of work encompasses all of this and more. The doubt that lingers between the lines is deliberate and contrived. For even though Dieteren initially follows the principles of line, hand, and movement, he never forgets to engage his thoughts. He is capable of creating from the deepest spontaneity of hand and paint, with reason and direction, never haphazardly. He knows the path laid out before him. His mind never loses sight of the flow of the line. “Objectification, the intensification of reality through his own experience of the object, that is, according to him, the ultimate intention of his most intimate work.”
www.ftn-books.com has the Bommel van Dam book on Dieteren now available.
To fully comprehend something, it is often helpful to trace its origins and tell its story. Jeroen van Bergen captures the genesis of architecture through his work. In his creation myth, the fundamental principle of architecture is the smallest room – the foundation and origin of the entire concept. He draws upon the dimensions and shape of this tiny yet habitable unit, the building block of cities and the world, from the building standards for WCs in the Netherlands. This module serves as the cornerstone of his artistic explorations. […]
In his earlier pieces, Van Bergen constructed a street, a tunnel passage, a cart, a bathing cubicle, and a shower room, all based on the “principle” of the WC module on a 1:1 scale. These works were not merely scale models, but rather simplified replicas showcasing the functionality of the smallest possible form of architecture. In recent years, Van Bergen has continued to utilize the module as a guiding principle, scaling down his creations and predominantly relying on scale models. His aim is to decipher the message conveyed by the mass reproduction and combination of the “smallest room” in the larger context of architecture. These various versions are created on both a building level, with diverse variations ranging from individual homes to blocks of houses and high-rise buildings, and a city level, featuring streets, rows of buildings, and advanced city models. On the city level, Van Bergen experiments with both horizontal and vertical stacks, resulting in captivating and diverse outcomes. The works featuring low stacks of “smallest rooms” evoke thoughts of sprawling, chaotic shantytowns that often pop up around modern mega-cities, traditional desert cities like those of M’Zab in Algeria, or even pre-Columbian settlements.
Ir. Peter Timmerman leads the Studium Generale at the University of Twente. In addition, he regularly publishes articles and books on the subjects of architecture and photography. He also serves as the director of the Architecture in Focus foundation.
Frédéric Borel is renowned for his iconic housing projects that embody a new architectural hedonism on Boulevard de Belleville, Rue Oberkampf, and Rue Pelleport. Drawing from the Paris experienced and described by surrealist poets as a profusion of secret spaces and a collage of heterogeneous elements, capable of generating improbable events and unexpected encounters, these constructions testify to a unique approach to the urban question. These fragmented or unitary forms, always in rupture, strive to create new communal spaces or attractive hubs around which social life can condense.
His expressionist architectures branch out to offer truly sensitive spaces, animated by free and audacious forms. In Béthune, Rouen, Grand-Quevilly, or Paris with the École d’Architecture de Paris Val de Seine, housing or public facilities projects stand out as tutelary figures that radiate in the urban landscape.
Answering these bursts of colorful volumes are the objects, more compact, more internalized, public facilities that assert themselves in front of nature or the city as calm and serene masses. The Hotel des Impôts de Brive-la-Gaillarde, the University of Agen, the Moskowa school, the palace of justice in Narbonne stand as monoliths in suspension. The fire stations of Besançon, Dijon, Nogent sur Marne…all compose a gentle continuity with the landscape.
This principle of active architecture remains at work in all projects, with spaces offered to all, where specific atmospheres intersect and overlap under the benevolent masses of blocks in levitation, to create a sumptuous city dedicated to walking and wandering, luxury and sensuality.
This dreamlike and visionary architecture opens new windows to the world, and proposes true fictions that fuel and enrich.
Bob Hanf was born on November 25, 1894 in Amsterdam, where his parents Joseph Hanf and Laura Romberg had settled shortly after their marriage. The Hanf family, assimilated German Jews, originally came from Westphalia. Hanf grew up in an artistic environment, spending most of his holidays in Germany with his uncle Moritz and his wife Rebecca until he was thirty. This couple had extensive connections in circles of intellectuals and artists. Through his regular visits to this artistic family, Hanf was exposed to the most cutting-edge trends in art, literature, and philosophy at a young age. Bob’s mother was skilled in playing the piano, and he received his first violin lessons in the ensemble class taught by George Scager, an alto violist in the Concertgebouw Orchestra.
Bob Hanf was a versatile artist: he drew, painted, wrote, and was also a violinist and composer. However, because his father wanted Bob to succeed him in the chemical company “N.V. Oranje,” he was sent to the Technical University in Delft. There, he first studied chemistry, and later, architecture. During his studies, he drew caricatures of professors and classmates and created a large number of charcoal drawings in an expressionistic style, akin to that of Beckmann and Kirchner. There was also a strong musical culture in Delft; Hanf regularly played alongside composers Harold C. King and Ignace Lilien. In 1919, he co-founded “De Coornschuer,” a warehouse in Delft, where concerts, lectures, and exhibitions were held.
During this period, Hanf came into contact with writers Hendrik Marsman, Jan Spierdijk, and Simon Vestdijk. In his book “Self Portrait of J.F.”, Marsman describes Hanf as follows: “lightly bent over, somewhat weary, collar of his coat turned up, his violin case carefully under his arm, he entered the elongated, low-ceilinged room on Voorstraat, where we were already waiting for him by a glowing stove.” Vestdijk’s book “The Last Chance” (1960) features Hanf under the alias Bob Neumann. Hanf himself wrote two plays, three novels, and several poems, influenced by the anti-bourgeois morality of Wedekind and the surrealist atmosphere and dark worldview of Kafka.
In 1921, Hanf quit studying for good and moved into an attic room in his parents’ house on Willemsparkweg in Amsterdam. It was during this time that he began playing the violin seriously and composing his first works. He took lessons with Louis Zimmerman, the first concertmaster of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. Although he played in a professional orchestra a few times, including the Arnhem Orchestra Association under the direction of Martin Spanjaard, he decided around 1928 not to pursue a professional violin career. Composing suited his contemplative nature better. He wrote various works for violin, several string quartets, songs using texts by Rilke, Kafka, and Goethe, a few orchestral works, and an opera.
His compositions are characterized by a motivic style, which becomes more chromatic over time, but remains within tonality and is more related to the German-Austrian tradition than the French. In his song cycles, Hanf emphasizes the absurdism of the text with a sense of theater. He always manages to create a very unique musical atmosphere with simple means.
In the year 1936, Bob Hanf left his parental abode to occupy a room on Lijnbaansgracht. In the year 1941, he, along with composer Robert de Roos, was awarded second place in a competition organized by the Rotterdam 1939 Foundation. While in hiding in the Suikerhofje on Prinsengracht, he wrote under the pseudonym Christiaan Philippus for the underground Duinrosia Heraut the poem “Reflections on the Dark Side of Life,” the only work of his to be published after the war. On April 23, 1944, he was arrested during a raid by the SD. He was subsequently deported to Auschwitz from Westerbork, where he was killed on September 30, 1944.
www.ftn-books.com has now the most impodstant book on Hanf available.
With his artistic training at the Textil-Ingenieurschule in Krefeld, Germany, Ron Rooymans began his journey as an artist. However, he quickly gravitated towards a more unconventional path.
In the years 1960-1963, he received lessons from Amsterdam painter Jos Rovers, solely focused on working from observation. In 1963, he was awarded the Encouragement Prize from the municipality of Eindhoven. From 1967 to 1983, Rooymans regularly spent long periods of time on the uninhabited island of Crevenish, off the coast of Ireland.
Early in his career, Rooymans’ work was figurative in nature, often incorporating a multitude of personal references. However, his friendship with architect Bart Linssen led to a shift in his initially baroque compositions, towards a more rigid, austere, and abstract style.
In 1975 on the island of Crevenish, Rooymans let go of figurative representations in his etchings for the first time. In 1977, also on Crevenish, he experienced an artistic breakthrough. Figuration disappeared entirely, and he began to work on rapid series of large canvases, each with its own unique language. These series were given names such as: ‘Not a soul but ourselves’, ‘Road paintings’, ‘Blood is thicker than water’, and ‘For The Fatherland’.
In the words of Rooymans himself: “I want to go beyond the canvas in my work.” This is clearly seen in his series ‘Thanks to the Edge’. He no longer only uses paint, but also incorporates tar, yarn, graphite, and chalk. His work becomes more spatial, sometimes taking over the entire studio.
www.ftn-books.com has now the 1981 NIJMEEGS MUSEUM catalog available.
At times, one may momentarily forget that Willem Snitker is a painter, for he is eager to step away from the lonely and solitary craft to create works with others or bring together creators such as poets, musicians, and composers. His studio and Bleeker Gallery in Heemstede contain a treasury of beauties resulting from such collaborations. The first project conceived by Willem that I took part in was a portfolio of poetry and graphics by renowned artists like Jan Sierhuis, Harry Mulisch, Ger Lataster, Gerrit Achterberg, and Nono Reinhold.
If one characteristic is emblematic of Snitker’s vision on the visual arts, it is his eagerness to fling open the doors and windows of his studio and embark on collaborations with others, as seen most recently with David Mitchell for the “DEJIMA” project and a book object on Sicily with Geerten Meijsing. Among other notable collaborations, he worked with Milanese poet Franco Loi, the angels of Michel van der Plas, Lucebert, Jan Elburg, Toer van Schaik, Jan Cremer, and Bert Schierbeek. Most recently, he discovered 35 stunning, unknown drawings in the attic of Mari Andriessen’s studio and, along with his wife, gifted a monumental Lataster work to the Haarlem Philharmonie on a long-term loan.
This brings to mind the impressive endeavors of Italian Renaissance artists and the way in which artists in the early European Modernism movement collaborated on books, films, and buildings.
www.ftn-books.com has the signed VILLA AURELIA publication from 1996 availbale.
Kris Van Dessel (born 1967 in Ekeren, resides and works in Antwerp) embarked on his artistic journey as a painter, but has since expanded his repertoire to include installations, videos, and performances. His body of work consistently revolves around the themes of architecture, urbanism, and ecology. Through his paintings and drawings, he frequently captures spatial “tensions” within our living environment.
www.ftn-books.com has the Maurits van de Laar catalog TRANSIT now available.
Artist/ Author: Oliver Boberg
Title : Memorial
Publisher: Oliver Boberg
Measurements: Frame measures 51 x 42 cm. original C print is 35 x 25 cm.
Condition: mint
signed by Oliver Boberg in pen and numbered 14/20 from an edition of 20
