exhibition
05/04/2025
L E T T E R S T O G I O T T O – P o r t i e r s l o g e / G a t e k e e p e r s l o d g e
April 7 – May 6 2025
all days of the week
lights on: 11.00 AM – 11.00 PM
L E T T E R S T O G I O T T O
Throughout Gert van Oortmerssen’s artistic career, the influence of his studies in art history, which he completed between 1982 and 1989, has been evident. Since the early 1990s, van Oortmerssen (born 1963 in Groningen) has been developing long-term series that he works on at intervals.
Letters to Giotto is one such series, in which observations on perspective play a central role. To the contemporary viewer, it may seem that the painters of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance did not (yet) fully grasp the theory of perspective.
But is this really the case? Was a mathematically accurate spatial illusion the highest priority in their artistic work? Or was the most important task to convey a story from a spiritual perspective? And how do these two aspects relate to each other?
Van Oortmerssen sees parallels with today’s society, where storytelling based on measured truth often struggles with storytelling based on felt truth. A sense of unease on the one hand, and curiosity on the other, have led him to engage in a “dialogue” with painters of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance – a fictional correspondence.
Letters to Giotto is a visual representation of Van Oortmerssen’s admiration and wonder at the use of perspective by artists of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance. It also reflects his fascination with the way they told their stories.
The Porter’s Lodge at Haddingestraat 26 in Groningen consists of a window and a small room on a busy street in the center of Groningen. Contemporary art is exhibited here. The room can only be seen from the outside.
This window gallery, also known as Groningen’s smallest gallery, has existed since 2008.
Haddingestraat 26
9711 KE Groningen – the Netherlands
contact: wilma.vissers@home.nl
new images
21/01/2025
Four works with a similar formal language as a starting point.The four-pass or quatrefoil is a common motif in the Gothic period. You find it in windows, tracery and balustrades. In essence, the motif consists of a square or diamond, combined with four circles.
open studios 2024
25/08/2024
O P E N S T U D I O S & O P E N M O N U M E N T S
Sunday 15 september 2024
11.00 am – 5.00 pm
During the Open Monuments Days 2024, the premises of the HVK, the Huurders Vereniging Kunstenaars, will be open to the public on Sunday 15 September.
Five monumental buildings in Groningen city centre have housed studios for visual artists for about 40 years, realised at the time by the ‘Foundation Housing and Working Spaces for Artists’. Affordable studios in suitable buildings were co-facilitated by the municipality – and especially the then alderman Ypke Gietema. A construction that prevented heritage from speculation, kept visual artists for the city and would ensure a good art climate. Many more than the HVK’s 60 or so studios have not been added in Groningen since then, and unfortunately the survival of what is there has been threatened for some time.
Two of the HVK’s premises are national monuments and the other three are among Groningen’s iconic buildings. As part of the Open Monuments Days, the buildings and studios located in them can be viewed on Sunday 15 September.
In the premises, you will find a range of classical and contemporary visual arts: figurative and abstract painting, sculpture and drawing, woodworking, photography, conceptual art and design to name a few. Several studios also host regular courses, workshops and act as bases for art-related activities. For instance, several cultural foundations are active, music and theatre productions are initiated and there is a small gallery (de ‘Portiersloge’).
A leaflet with names and locations of participants is available throughout the city, for example at the Forum and at the Museum on the A, or can be found under leaflet (in Dutch).
You are most welcome!
Pelsterstraat 37
9711 KH Groningen
exhibition
13/09/2019
TEKENKABINET – pop up
Tekenkabinet (Drawing Cabinet) presents a pop-up exhibition at IJburg, Amsterdam, from 13 – 29 september 2019. The works shown before at the Amstelpark will now be exhibited in a completely different environment. The setting is raw and industrial. It will evoke an entirely different experience.
Drawing Cabinet: grand drawing on a small scale
Drawing Cabinet: grand drawing on a small scale
Tekenkabinet – pop up
Pampuslaan 11
1087 HN Amsterdam
13 – 29 september 2019
friday, saturday, sunday from 13.00 – 17.00
tram 26
free parking on sundays
exhibition
14/04/2019
ZOMERKABINET
grand drawing on a small scale:
the 7th edition of the Drawing Cabinet in the Amstelpark
Tekenkabinet
Amstelpark 13
1083HZ Amsterdam
opening
Sunday 5 May 15.00 – 17.00
Sunday 5 – Sunday 26 May 2019
Thursday – Sunday 13.00 – 17.00
highlighted
01/04/2019
Defriending my facebook was inspired by a message in the newspaper. A model looks at you… with an empty face. Tears in her eyes, shimmering like diamonds. The WAC logo ‘sparkles’ as well: accentuating the drama even stronger.
Have you been defriended yet? (dutch)
installation
01/07/2018
every time that you touch it, it’ll turn against you…
Portiersloge
Haddingestraat 26
9711KC Groningen (NL)
1 july – 28 august 2018
every time that you touch it, it’ll turn against you…when you open tombs. Like me. Because it is your job, because you consider it normal.
Normal?
That shriveled unity must be taken apart, disassembled! In between the fragments there is seeing … and knowing, and understanding, and of course truth. Yes, oh yes, truth! Truth is difficult, is erratic and fluid, slips out of your hands.
Truth?
Is being made, is made beautiful, will be explained, sold. And then?
A final resting place is a final resting place …
Do not touch me.
Please.
Now I just want to thank you, for going insane. Every second that you suffer, is a loss that I gain. Every breath is a drain down, down into a hole. And your mind is a shrinking thing – it was crushed by your skull. Now you feel time unfolding, deep in your chest. And your body’s expanding, now there’s none of you left. So I just want to thank you, for losing your mind. Yeah you burned just like joan of arc, purified by the flames. You’re alive! You’re alive! Now just want to thank you, for the light that you spread. And magnesium and sulphur, and the fear in your head. And I just want to tell you, you’re nothing so new. Every time that you touch it, it’ll turn against you. Now your future’s a cold thing, down in the damp ground. And your memory’s a lead room, containing this sound. So I just want to thank you, for killing your mind. All the life that you bleed out, well I steal it for mine. You’re alive! you’re alive!
SWANS | She lives | THE GREAT ANNIHILATOR (1995)
new images
05/06/2018
New images: an early, ‘classical’ work from the 1980’s (The art of history), a painting from 2015 (A tick of the times (WAC 2008)) and two WAC logos from 2016 (Transgesture #1 and Transgesture #2).