Thousand Faces For as long as I can remember I am fascinated by the human face. By painting others and myself I try to unravel the mysteries of life. My obsession with these mysteries and the human face lead to a series of thousand selfportraits: the Thousand Faces. My innerworld is main subject in this series. I had little interest in the outward appearance of my face, I wanted to paint and draw the feelings I could see behind the skin. Main goal was to make visible what at first sight stays hidden for the eye.
The series consist of thousand drawings and paintings, good ones and failures next to eachother. With the Thousand Faces I step into the great European tradition of portraying.

Americans is a work in progress. It is an answer to Thousand Faces.The reason I chose Americans to be subject of the series is because they initiately felt like the people opposed to me: inhabitants of the New World, the land of opportunities.
The series consist of three parts:
First a several portraits based on my fantasies and prejudices of Americans. I travelled to the States after making the first series and stayed for two months. Coming back to Holland I painted the second series, based on confirmed prejudices and memory.
The third and last part is still under construction. I paint Americans I see in glossies, newspapers, on television and in real life.

By painting people I unravel the feeling of opposition. We’re all humans trying to make a living on this planet. We all have dreams and longings, in that we are the same. Americans appeared to me as people with careful protected insides. I am trying to find openings by drawing and painting them. In the portraits I show what makes the human face so intrigueing: the secret layers where emotions hide and grand histories lie.