04 Jul 2011
by ellenin art Tags: 3D, colors, colours, dark, glass, glassartist, glasses, lamp, marketplace, reflections, steellead, summer, sunglasses
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A while ago I met a somewhat quirky young artist who told me about his vast collection of collections. Who gets it into his head to go around the Netherlands to browse collections of others to buy? That would be Pet van de Luijtgaarden.
Pet had already been looking at his collections for a while when he decided to spice up part of it. He decided to invite other artists to each take home one of the collections and make something new out of it . Me and 19 others got involved in Pets Marktplaats (Pet’s Marketplace).
In January I visited Pet’s large studio in an old office building. His space was filled with big boxes, full of pins, Batman dolls, McDonalds toys, jewelry and so on, and so on. In one room he had even made an arrangement with all pinkish Barbie stuff, a big bright Mattel world…I barely could constrain the ten-year-old screaming girl inside me. On the way home I had 40 pounds of sunglasses in the back of my car and a plan in my head to build a lamp out of it.
One month ago, the big news came: Pet was promised an exhibition in the Kunsthal. If, however, he would be able to get everything done within two weeks! And one week before, my home-built frame had collapsed!
I put up a big search for a frame through the lovely world of social media and miraculously, in between all the very helpful posts (among others there was tweep Nancy Kers who spend a whole day to try and help me find alternative materials), I received a message by Lisette Spapens, glass-artist: “You live nearby, right? I’m coming over right now!”
Lisette built me a beautiful frame of steel lead. It was her first experience with a 3D object! Many nightly hours later, hours of experimenting and building, there it was: my 30-pound lamp!
Last saturday the big day of the official opening had arrived: all of Pet’s collections were beautifully displayed and next to it were the creations of me and my 19 colleagues. So proud!
About the exhibition (from the website of the Kunsthal):
Pet is a visual artist who is fascinated by the absurdity of abundance when it comes to ‘stuff’. ‘Shops are getting larger and fuller, but what we need it all for?’ As a collector, Van de Luijtgaarden buys discarded collections of objects such as disposable lighters, frogs, GI Joe action dolls and Flippos (Pogs), all of which have been neatly arranged to create a cabinet of curiosities for the exhibition. It seems the absurdity of it ‘never being enough’ is irrevocable.
As a child, Pet van de Luijtgaarden collected beer bottles and postage stamps; later, when he was a student, it were books that he collected. Nowadays, as a visual artist, Van Luijtgaarden voraciously buys up private collections including caps, porcelain cats, pencil sharpeners, spectacles and milk bottle tops! He spends hours on the Dutch digital marketplace ‘Marktplaats’ and drives all over the Netherlands buying up collections that are often being sold as a last resort, for example in the event of financial difficulties, death, divorce or lack of space.
Sneak peek of Pet’s work:
My work:
A sign said:
Ellen Vesters (1979, Ulft)
Summersphere, 2011
Hanging lamp made with the sunglasses
With the cooperation of Lisette Spapens
* Ellen Vesters incorporated the glass of hundreds of sunglasses into her sculpture to, in her own words: “enhance the beauty of light, to color and reshape her.”
(unfortunately, because of all the backlight the reflections on the walls weren’t as dramatic as they were intended to be)
The other participating artists:
Fenny Faber – Els Petit – Choi Wong – Jacco de Jager – Roos van der Heiden – Ghita van Bergen – Sylvia Stolan - Eva Bullens – Tim van de Meer – Jessica de Kort – Malou Cohen – Sarah Gunti – Astrid Willems – Britt Dorenbosch – Erik Fusco – Robin de Wilde.
14 May 2011
by ellenin digital media, humor, illustration, inspiration, mixed media, painting, pen and ink Tags: 7daysofinspiration, 7di, 7dimag, blue, color, girl, helmet, humor, illustration, leather, paper, paperplane, people, plane, watercolor, watercolour, woman
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Let me tell you about a beautiful dutch initiative. In 2009 Martijn Aslander felt inspired by the clean up project in Estland and decided to found the 7 Days of Inspiration. His idea: to give the Netherlands an upgrade by spreading inspiration on social goodwill, culminating in 7 Days of Inspiration.
7 Days of inspiration has grown to be a week full of positivity. This year the 7 Days took place in the first week of march. 14 Dutch cities were involved! All kinds of people came together to start all kinds of inspirational sustainable initiatives.
I contributed to the magazine that was launched that week. The magazine found it’s inspiration in a dutch part of the twitter community called “dare to ask”. You can use the hashtag #daretoask if you have some burning question, and with which you can make an appeal to other tweeps to help you out. The magazine thought this was characteristic of social goodwill.
41 Professionals collaborated in this magazine. Illustrators and photographers were asked to use a tweet as inspiration for their art. The one I used said: who wants to make a dance of joy with me?
My illustration:
(click on image to enlarge)
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Very happy when I opened the magazine (and the paper smelled sooo good!):
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Here’s a link to the complete magazine, I am on page 31:
http://www.7dimag.nl/
10 May 2011
by ellenin inspiration Tags: armando ello, networking, photographer, photography
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Somebody made me blush this week. The very gifted photographer Armando Ello wrote a flattering blog about my networking skills (it’s in dutch)…!
http://www.armando-ello.com/hoe-moet-je-netwerken-column-blog/
08 May 2011
by ellenin digital media, illustration, mixed media, pencil Tags: collaboration, creaturemag, crimescene, drama, grim, icebear, illustration, pink, poem, poetry, red, tent, theovangogh, thriller
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It’s been a little while ago, but I wouldn’t want you to miss out on this fascinating collaboration. In february, together with the amazing Gilly Rochester and Daria Hlazato I was featured on the Creaure Mag blog with an illustration accompanying a grim poem by Ben Macnair.
The image of a crime scene immediately made me think of an infamous, brutal murder in the Netherlands. On the 2nd of november, 2004, filmmaker Theo van Gogh was murdered by an extremist, because of his controversial opinions. The illustration I made was inspired by one of the most well known pictures from this time. The ice bears are a reference to the snow in Bens poem and to the white suits, worn by the crime scene investigators.
Bens poem and my illustration:
Crime Scene
Don’t follow the red snow,
it is a warning,
that around here are
Grim fairy tales
with an eighteen certificate.
(click image to enlarge)
25 Apr 2011
by ellenin art, digital media, humor, illustration, marker, mixed media Tags: aspartame, baby, banner, blogger, bottle, design, diet coke, grunge, humor, red, wall, writer
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Back again!
I am so sorry that I neglected my little piece of the internet.
I have been quite busy with only good things: reflecting on where I would like this website, and mostly my creative life, to go and working on new drawings. I’ve got a lot of new stuff to show you!
First of, I have been designing a banner for a dutch writer/ blogger. He was looking for a banner that would display the atmosphere of the metaphor that he used: “a breached wall”. He also wanted a grungy feel to it.
And while I was at it, I also made a drawing to accompany one of his language jokes.
The title of the drawing is (translated): “aspartame upbringing”. Is this a saying in english too? In dutch a spartan upbringing means that your parents are raising you in a strict, sober, harsh way.
(click image to enlarge)
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14 Feb 2011
by ellenin art, inspiration Tags: books, jessica gowling
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The kind and inventive Jessica Gowling wrote a post about her love of books and of course I submitted pictures of my collection (you’ll have to scroll to the bottom of the post to seem them):
http://naturesmyfriend.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/printed-pages-and-the-places-we-keep-them/
02 Jan 2011
by ellenin art
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30 Dec 2010
by ellenin humor, illustration, pen and ink Tags: balloon, dream, humor, illustration, orange, people, sloth
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Illustrations I made for an article about dreaming of impossible physical actions. There were a good number of entries, so fingers crossed that one of mine will be chosen!
(click image to enlarge)
(click image to enlarge)
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