“The real voyage of discovery consists, not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.”
Marcel Proust, La Prisonniere ( 1923) p 69.
Again and again the same motif seen and viewed differently. The series ” Pits” started early 2020 with a painting about the final parting with my dog of 12 years: the image of a hole dug to measure.
What started off as one painting became a series where the same motif was repeatedly explored in a different colour and in a varying size.
The image of a small shallow space dug into the surface.
In March came the lockdown. Suddenly we all found ourselves in a small space where everything needed to be viewed through different eyes.
My life existed of: house, garden studio. And a lot of time.
I started with sowing and planting to make my small space livelier, and more attractive.
Drawing my direct surroundings was a way to make the small world seem bigger in my experience.
As I was drawing a shovel I realised that the motif of digging and altering not only signifies the end but also the beginning.
In my studio the motif of the pit developed simultaneously into an evermore shallow space.
It became a n investigation into the rendition of depth in a field.
To me it is about the division of thing and space and the rendering of a raised area through shadow. Our eyes make up for the things that are not there by reading the counter form.
The shovel, the digging, is hiding, is saying farewell.
The shovel, digging around, preparing, is beginning.
The brush is shovel to make new images.
Bettie van Haaster, 2021
(Translation K. Houterman)
