maartje jaquet

Bezielde Lijnen – Soulful Lines
From september 17th I was in Suriname as an Artist in Residence to work on Bezielde lijnen (Soulful Lines), duo exhibition of visual artists Rinaldo Klas and Maartje Jaquet. The exhibition is open from October 04 until November 02, 2019. Opening hours: Monday thru Friday, 08:00-16:30 hrs and on Saturday, 08:30-13:30 hrs at Readytex Art Gallery (RAG) (also on Facebook), Steenbakkerijstraat 30, Paramaribo, Suriname.

Readytex Art Gallery (RAG) opens a special new duo exhibition on October 3rd. Bezielde lijnen shows the surprising results of the synergy between two artists who have been connected as friends and colleagues for ten years now: Rinaldo Klas in Suriname and Maartje Jaquet from Amsterdam.

When Maartje Jaquet entered the gardens of the Nola Hatterman Art Academy during her first time in Suriname ten years ago, in order to make a film about leafcutter ants – which she had never seen before – she was approached by the academy’s director Rinaldo Klas. He wanted to know who the unannounced visitor was, and what she was doing there. This encounter led to a lasting connection between the two artists and they have since kept each other informed about the developments their careers and their personal lives. They found common ground in their work through their use of lines. Both artists use simple lines to try to capture the deeper essence of that which they record. For Rinaldo that is the soul of nature and for Maartje the soul of the people that she portrays. They also share their commitment to nature and the environment and made, especially for this exhibition, a joint art work in which this is the central theme.

In the past Maartje Jaquet often worked with film and photography. During her stay in Suriname in 2009 for example, she made so-called One Minute videos of her impressions. In recent years she has been focusing more on drawing and painting people with pen, pencil and watercolor. She enjoys making quick sketches of people in public spaces, such as at the market, the library or in stores, with the common thread being the diversity and at the same time the unity of the people. She subsequently completes the sketches with watercolors. In this exhibition she shows a number of portraits that she made during a residency at the Centrum voor Beeldende Kunst in Amsterdam Zuidoost, in 2017. Especially for Bezielde lijnen Maartje also made a number of portraits of people in Paramaribo, most of them at the Waterkant.

Rinaldo Klas is a well-known Surinamese visual artist. Since the nineties, the main theme of his work is the great effect that human intervention has on the environment. For Bezielde Lijnen he created figurative monoprints and acrylic paintings. The common ground between him and Maartje, the use of lines in their work, is clearly visible in the dynamics of the lines in the monoprints of people. In his colorful acrylic paintings Rinaldo expresses his involvement with people and the environment.