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Jan Voss (1936)… more complex over the years

Schermafbeelding 2017-09-01 om 11.38.35

I have seen developing Jan Voss’s work over almost 4 decades now and with each new decade and exhibition, it looks to me that his works are getting more complex. The fundaments of his art are the same , but he squeezes more elements in the same drawing/painting. Brightly colored these are a joy for me to look at, but unfortunately for Voss, his work was only noticed by some curators in Belgium, France , the Netherlands and Germany and outside these countries his work is hardly known. It is in these countries his admirers can be found. For decades, Jan Voss has experimented with various different techniques, materials and groups of works. The underlying theme in his work is creating order in the midst of a perpetually moving chaos of complex situations – chaos and order, construction and decay of uncertain situations, similar to the conditions that exist in everyday life. Today, this state is bombarded by a number of signs and meanings which also play a major role in Jan Voss’s art.

There is one publication i would like to mention and which is of course available at www.ftn-books.com. It is the catalogue Jan Voss made for the Haags Gemeentemuseum, NADRUK. The exhibition was curated by Gerrit Jan de Rook and the book that was published with this exhibition was a true artist book of which the original edition was only 1000 copies, but i know for a fact that over 600 copies were destroyed, because they could not be sold. The remaining part was sold over the years at Sales and other special occasions. This artist book from 1984 is completely designed and filled by Jan Voss. A book in which he gives his Voss interpretation of the collection of the Gemeentemuseum. For those of you that have an interest in Voss, now is the time to pick up his works and books , still affordable and a great investment for the future.