Does every painting have a specific radiance? The reflection of light on a surface is well noticeable: is it what the painting makes this specific painting, this specific technique?
What if the surface is gold? Is the radiance more bright? With the knowledge that the ground color of the surface does have influence on the way it is perceived, I started my research of painting on gold. I remember that I read somewhere that Rembrandt painted on gold for the same reason.
The first obstacle I had to conquer was the surface being very smooth; not very easy to paint on. In combination with the material being very precious and easily destroyed, I had to work in utter concentration.
The first paintings I made are these mandalas, one-dimensional structures, painted with white and one colour, mostly ceruleum blue. Starting from the middle without no plan, just concentration ending up like this. Very refined.
After the mandalas I wanted to know what would happen when I use colours on gold. My parrot feathers – who have this brilliant satin lustre themselves – as the subjects to paint. I worked in very thin layers so that the gold could shine through. I love the beauty of briljant and shiny things, like precious gemstones. Gold is rare and precious, working on gold is therefor something which asks for a great responsibiliy. It feels like a meditation. A panel with a cover of 24 karat gold is already very beautiful, full and pure. During the time I worked on the panels I collected information about gold, feathers, in symbolic ways and scientifically. This is what I found on wikipedia: isn’t that awesome!
