Jan Mankes
Parelhoen
1917
oil on panel
27,5 x 37,5 cm
Museum Belvédère, Heerenveen: loan private collection
My first conscious
encounter with the work of Jan Mankes was in Museum Belvédère in Heerenveen.
Han Steenbruggen combined our works together in a cabinet in the exhibition
Reshuffle in 2008.
From an interview with Han Steenbruggen by Henk Sletterink in MB-0 dec. 2008:
Not all
combinations in the exhibition Reshuffle are obvious. Jan Mankes and Janus
Metsaars for example.
And precisely that combination was the first that came to my mind. In both
their works lies the need to grasp the bigger mystery in the things around us.
And while attempting to fathom these secrets they lay their souls bare. What I
like so much in both the work of Mankes and Metsaars is that matter dissolves before
your eyes and becomes immaterial, however different their technique is.
And it does
not matter that the one works realistic and the other abstract?
I do not see any difference. If you look closer at this guinea fowl by
Jan Mankes you surely see the subtleties of color and tone, your eye disappears
into that beautiful color glow. Then you feel that the guinea is reason to
evoke emotions that lie much deeper. It's pure abstraction. Metsaars does no
different. He sees the evening light reflect in water or moss grow on a tree ..
They both connect a sort of cosmic consciousness with earthly things. At least
that's how I experience it.
Oerzee
2015
pigment. binder, linen
30 x 35cm
collection Museum Belvédère, purchased in 2016
Janus Metsaars (NL)
Oerruimte
2015
pigment, binder, linen
30 x 35cm
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