Textile in the Mix

Wearing two pairs of socks, jeans, a singlet, a t-shirt, a blouse and the most hideous (and huge) wollen cardigan you've ever seen, the summer seems so far away now. But it was the summer when we started this project... and this december we will reveal it, at CBK Rotterdam!
Haadjar Fris, an artist/teacher from Rotterdam asked six (fairly) young designers from Rotterdam to collaborate with six women that weren't born in Holland, but who are experts at a 'forgotten' technique such as knitting, crocheting or embroidery. We were supposed to give this somewhat oldfashioned craft a fresh look by mixing it with modern techniques, views or material.

I remember thinking: 'oh, this can be fun but I hate crochet so I really hope she's not going to match me with a crochet-person'. What did I get? I know, I jinxed it. As it turns out, I hate it so much that I almost gave up on the project, because I just don't have the patience or the love for it.

In the end, I decided to just ignore the wool and the needle and turn the whole thing around and now the exhibition will finally happen. On saturday december 18th from 14.30h - 16.30. Expect original (affordable) pieces by Kwannie Tang, Yvonne Gaemers, Daisy Kroon, Zelda Beauchampet, Diana van Golden and yours truly.

Join us for a drink and a happy dance!

Saturday december 18th, Nieuwe Binnenweg 75, Rotterdam

De Kooning Te Rijk!

For the past couple of months, I have had the privilege of being a subsitute teacher at Rotterdam Art Academy. For about eleven mondays in a row I got to hang out with an awesome group of second year illustration students. Which was of course, very cool!

My last assignment was a rather difficult one. Because the students had to take the assignment of another course which was pretty vague, abstract and not very visual and turn it into a sellable product. This caused sweat, pain and yes... I even saw some tears. But even though I have to be patient for a little while longer, I believe the endresult will be stunning.

The students' work will be on exhibition (and for sale!) this friday at Gallery Blaak 10, Rotterdam.

Time: 17.30 - 21.00u, Place: Witte de Withstraat 7a

In The Flesh

When I was asked to put a groupshow together at projectspace Dek 22 I thought: 'ow jeez, WHEN am I going to do this?'. Then I thought: 'kinda cool'. One hour later all the participants were chosen, called and confirmed... 'WOW'.

The exhibitants are Marie Civikov, Wietse Eeken and Niek Westendorp and all three are very gifted and very cool. Marie makes huge paintings with bright colors and shocking images. She's got a very original and personal style of painting that I really like. Wietse makes big objects out of stone that are very raw and very in your face. They are so big and heavy that he needs a big truck with a lift to get his stuff from one place to another. Niek is an incredible painter that makes collage-style work. He paints layer on top of layer creating very intriguing sometimes scary images.

To make the flesh move, there will be music by me and the wonderful DJ Miss Delicious followed by a live show of J.C. Thomas & The Missing Slippers. Hope to see you there!

Thursday april 29th, 18.00-22.00u, Willem Buytewechstraat 22, Rotterdam

One week later, during the In The Flesh exhibit, the very talented fashion designer Daisy Kroon will open the fashion exhibition Skin, Skinner, Skinniest.

This will be a one night event with chocolate sneakers, skin-toned dresses, a pop-up closet and more. Sounds cool? Make sure you visit Dek 22 on friday may 7th at 19.30.

100

Clap your hands everybody, because this is our our 100th blog post!! And funnily enough this 100th post is about a project I took part in recently, called Jazz Cakes 100!

100 t-shirts were handed out to 100 artists from various disciplines by Jazz Cakes, an artist collective based here in Cardiff. Each artist had to work with a designated number to create a piece from the starting point of this plain t-shirt. I got number 77..

Of course the first thing that came to my mind was BINGO. Pretty obvious, but as I moved to the UK I noticed that bingo is taken much more seriously over here. Much more. I pass a bingo hall every day on my way into town and I’ve become intrigued by the whole ‘bingo culture’. I started fantasizing what goes on in behind those doors. The anticipation, the suspense, the defeats and the victories…

Instead of making a print or cutting the shirt up, I decided to keep it close to its subject by making brooches, an accessory usually associated with old ladies (just like Bingo is).

I drew lots of elderly ladies and taxi's (to my annoyance there's always a huge line of cabs parked on the cycle lane in front of the bingo hall) and I learned a lot about bingo lingo!

It took a while for the Jazz Cakes to retrieve all 100 shirts, but the countdown has begun: the exhibition opens this Saturday April 10 at gallery Studio B, 24 Tudor Lane (Riverside) in Cardiff. Drop by anytime from 18.00 till 23.00!

The Fine Lines I need

Some fine lines are a slap in the face, but others are a real treat. All the good ones will be on exhibition this friday at projectspace DEK22 in Rotterdam.

No illustrator, photoshop or other ways to enhance an image were used in the selected work. So you can have a look at the original artwork done with pen, ink or pencil. Participants are: Roos mascini, Nelleke Transister, Natasa Heydra, Kalam Man, Peter van Genderen, Evalien Lang, Nanna Koekoek and myself.

Come check it out, and enjoy my cosiest tunes and Augusta Wind's food! Time: 16.00u - 20.00u. Place: Willem Buytewechstraat 22, Rotterdam.

3月6日（土）から静岡にてエキシビションスタート!!!

It's a dream come true: my work is going to JAPAN!! (I would love to go with it, but alas...) It is part of the exhibition Grow Ups, which opens this Saturday, March 6 in the Center for Creative Communications in Shizuoka.

The exhibition is curated by Renée Reijnders, who initially put the show together for the gallery Corrosia!, Almere in 2008. On invitation of CCC the exhibition is now traveling to Japan.

As title Grow Ups suggests the works maneuver between mature art and childlike fantasy. The other participating artists are IRIS, Merijn Hos, Lennard Schuurmans, Pepijn van den Nieuwendijk, Ingrid de Lugt, Wayne Horse, Mark Verhaagen, Leendert Masselink, Bjorn Eulink and Manumanu. Since you're probably unable to attend the exhibition in Japan, I suggest you take a look at the websites of the participating artists to get an impression of what a great show this is going to be!

Slightly Surreal

What to do on a (rainy) Sunday after one of the best nights out you ever experienced in your life?? That was exactly my question the day after the Warehouse Project in Manchester...

Well, after a sturdy breakfast of scrambled eggs, coffee and freshly squeezed OJ my boyfriend and I decided to drag ourselves to the Manchester Art Gallery for the exhibition Angels of Anarchy - Women Artists and Surrealism. They had great works on display by a.o. Francesca Woodman, Frida Kahlo and Meret Oppenheim. But my heart truly skipped a beat when I saw some collaborative pieces. They were made along the same principle as our drawings for the Freikörperkult t-shirts! I had never seen these before.

Y. Tanguy, Joan Miro, Max Morix and Man Ray (1927).

Andre Breton, Jacqueline Lamba and Yves Tanguy (1938).

Andre Breton, Paul Eluard, Nusch Eluard and Valentine Hugo (ca. 1930).

Andre Breton, Valentine Hugo, Greta Knutson and Tristan Tzara (ca. 1933).

I didn't know this 'game' had a name. It's called EXQUISITE CORPSE. The Surrealists used to play it with words as well, and exquisite corpse is taken from the first sentence that was produced this way: "Le cadavre exquis boira le vin nouveau.", which translates to "The exquisite corpse will drink the new wine."

The title of our t-shirts was sort of randomly picked after one of our favourite German words: Freikörperkultur, roughly translated as Free Body Movement, which advocates a naturistic/nudist way of life. We encountered the Freikörperkultur up close and personal at the swimming pool in Berlin this summer. The word suited our drawings perfectly, especially when we shortened it to -kult.

Anyways, I just thought it was so cool to see these drawings that I wanted to share them with you. I now know our drawings aren't just weird, no, they are Surreal!

Ladies first, then Staedtlers.

This blogpost is not about informing you that I have an exhibition coming up in Amsterdam on november 27th, with some very cool ladies.. Nono, it's about my love for the Staedtler 0.1 and 0.05mm.

I don't know if any of you ever experienced this, but personally I'm very VERY supersticious when it comes to drawing, and my pen of choice. Besides the music that should exactly fit my mood of that moment, I am absolutely convinced that some pens or pencils have a wrong vibe. They make my drawing come out all ugly. Which is of course frustrating, but also good, I can always blame the pen. Recently I go hand-in-hand with my Staedtlers. They are THE pens of the moment. I think everybody should get one.

Not convinced? Come to our capital city next friday the 27th and see what my Staedtlers can do. Besides my drawings, I think this exhibition will be awesome considering the coolness of the other participants. Ephameron, Bitches in Control, Moama, Lil'Shy, Ovni and Minivila will definately bring some streetwise visual spectacle.
Check out the flyer for details.

Monsters on my mind..

For the past couple of months I was a coach. Not sports related (I have NO tactics) but art related.



Rotterdam kids' museum Villa Zebra planned to have an exhibition called 'The Monsterfactory'. Among the work of several established artists they wanted to involve students of the illustration department from the local artschool. Students could pitch an idea and get a spot among the monsters. I was there for the technical sollutions and to help the raw ideas grow into exhibition-worthy work. That was fun! It was really inspirational to work with these people and I think that the endresult is something we can all be proud of! Have a little sneak-peek below. (Work: Ron Schuijt)


Next friday (september 18th), will be the grand opening. From 13.30 you can come and see the endresult. And if you're a kid, you can take a monster related workshop. This will be fun, no doubt.

Villa Zebra, Stieltjesstraat 21, Rotterdam

homo universalis 2.0. in a TENT.....

It all goes down at the Witte de Withstraat in Rotterdam this week! Tomorrow is the opening of BLURRR in exhibition space for contemporary art TENT. It's a very special exhibition/event to celebrate TENT's 10th birthday. Hurray!

BLURRR (excuse me while I quote from the website) "reveals a new cultural practice in which the young artist goes beyond the borders of different disciplines and presents him/herself as homo universalis 2.0. (...) Thanks to the possibilities of the Internet, it seems that multitasking has become the most important basis for the practice of art without being noticed. Artists are simultaneously a performer, singer or designer. They work alternately in collectives, duos and groups. They share their knowledge or work on social network sites such as Facebook, Hyves or MySpace and assign the public an active role in their work." Sounds kind of familiar?! That's why TENT approached Dutch Dolls to take part in the large-scale educational project that accompanies the exhibition.

The educational project is named 'Wildgroei' ('proliferation') and is organized by an occasional artist collective, consisting of S.P.A.M. van Griensven, Selfcontrolfreak, Ivo Vrouwe and Maartje Aben and Dutch Dolls' own Geeske. From the 9th of September till the 15th of November high school students will work with the collective on an installation. Every move is being monitored by a camera, so you can keep track of the whole thing (somewhere) online.

Anyways, come to the opening tomorrow at 18.00 to enjoy performances by the HuMobisten and Nina Boas, music, drinks and food (by Hete Bliksem!)! Or take a look at the Wildgroei in progress sometime during the Wereld van de Witte de With Festival.

next Friday: (p)arty!

Okay, summer is over... which means it's time again for the annual Wereld van de Witte de With Festival in Rotterdam! Of course Dutch Dolls are represent! We're really looking forward to seeing all these artsy folks again :-) Drop by at gallery BLAAK10 this Friday between 19.00 and 20.00 to kick off this 3-day festival with us!! Enjoy the exhibition of Bier en Brood while rocking steady (or rocking out - why not) to our DJ-set.

Bier en Brood is a multi-disciplinary art collective from the Netherlands, and quiet a few members of its crew are (former) students of the Willem de Kooning Academy (where the Dolls were taught and have taught themselves). In April of this year they made the biggest piece of graffiti EVER.... 3000 m2 on container ship NileDutch Kwanza. The exhibition includes photographs of the project and the screening of the documentary ‘HOTEL KWANZA’. And Bier en Brood will be working on a 3D installation in the gallery. It should be fun in BLAAK10 with some excellent DJs, like Nickelle Kees and Black Langebach (of Venour) and peeps of Bier en Brood themselves. So as the Bier and Broodsters say: (p)arteeeeee!!!

this weekend in Roffa

Although I have no regrets about leaving Rotterdam to set out on great adventures abroad, I sometimes dearly wish I was still there... So many great people, so many good friends, lots of fun stuff going on, and let's not forget it's the city where they invented the KAPSALON (shoarma, fries, metled cheese, salad and garlic sauce)! I miss it.

Take this weekend for example...

On Friday Dutch Doll Geeske's musical collabaration with Auke, TERROR DORKS, will make its debut at Worm!! Auke is the beatmaster and Geeske is on vocals, owww yeah! She's been sending me some lyrics and they are absolutely hilarious!! I just know this song about the KAPSALON is going to be catchy as hell. I can't believe I'm going to miss this! All together this whole Beniworm evening sounds excellent: 'open sauce' barbecue, inflatable objects, more music and cold beer... Mmmm. I wish I could just teletransport myself!

Then on Saturday Antistrot presents the mural they've been working on at the espresso bar in Museum Boijmans van Beuningen. They'll start off with some performances at 14.00. I think you should prepare for the worst. I overheard a bit of the soundtrack for it, and it had something to do with 'Mannenkoor Karrespoor'... Then at 15.30 it's time for boozing as the mural will be disclosed. Read some in depth information about this artists collective at the Boijmans website (great it includes the word 'onderbroekenlol').

While you're in the neighborhood, why don't you hop over to the MK Gallery in the Witte de Withstraat, where Pim Palsgraaf has an opening (more free booze!) at 16.00. Maybe you'll be able to spot parts of the stuffed seagull and the stuffed pheasant, that were once hanging in my living room, in his art works.

Well have fun you guys, I'll be thinking of you...

file under: canceled shows

So this weekend I was in London and I was thrilled that Rye Rye would be in town as well! This girl (she is barely 18 I think) from Baltimore has already worked with the likes of M.I.A., Blaqstarr, Diplo and The Count and Sinden. No cat pee, as we would say in Holland! Anyways... on Fridaynight we headed to East London for this club Cargo. When we got there it was well beyond midnight and there was a looooong queue. We had been standing in line for a good 20 minutes (my boyfriend even had gone to the off license around the corner to fetch us some beers to make the wait bearable) when we reached this sign:

Exit queue.

I hope things are okay with Rye Rye and family (may be she is a distant relative of MJ??!)... We enjoyed the rest of our beers while we wandered the streets of übertrendy Shoreditch, watching the hipsters and their fixies. Even though I was absolutely gutted by Rye Rye's cancellation, it couldn't ruin my weekend in London. I had a really good time with friends. I went to a screening of animations by Don Hertzfelt (plus Q&A with the man himself) and I visited a great exhibition of my heroes Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake at the Museum of Childhood, where I saw some original drawings of the latter for the first time in my life (it made my eyes watery). And I went on a boat ride.
So what the heck, here is Rye Rye's latest with our darling M.I.A..

Rye Rye feat. M.I.A. - Bang. Get it here (YSI).

how does he do it do it?

O how we love remixes! So this record should be a real treat for us. Amsterdam duo The Moi Non Plus invited befriended artists to remix the songs and artwork of their debut album. Our good friend About was one of them and he did an excellent job on What If We Do It, mashing it up with a tune by Michael Nyman. The remix clearly bears the About signature: cut up electronics but still poppy and catchy and dancy! You can download it for free, legally, from the Subbacultcha website (or at the bottom of this post)!! A whole bunch of other (visual) artists have contributed to this unique multimedia thing, like Kania Tieffer, Aux Raux, Machinefabriek, Aquil Copier and Paul Borchers, just to name a few. Paul is playing as Yobkiss TONIGHT at the launch party in Gallery W139 in Amsterdam. As well as the boys of TMNP of course.

The Moi Non Plus - What If We Do It (ABOUT's Crossmatch Re-Edit).
Get it here (YSI).

Dees and Gees Voorhees

Tonight Geeske is DJ'ing solo as Gees Voorhees at the opening of COVERSTORIES - an exhibition by Dees, in Singersweatshop! This artist, hailing from Eindhoven, is making a 'recordstore type installation' (consisting of paintings, graphic art and collages) in the SSS. Another reason for going is the yummie food provided by the lovely ladies of Hete Bliksem. You're all invited!

Friday 22.05.09 from 17.00 till 23.00 / Hoogstraat 170, Rotterdam.

Bums, books 'n big tv-screens..

Talking about a Rotterdam-invasion... our designs are now on exhibition at the youth department of the library of Rotterdam which officially opened on April 22nd.

This area of the library is dedicated to youth-culture and focuses mainly on music, art, design and computers. It is a place to chill and read, with Dutch Dolls designs in the background! Go take a look if you're in the neighbourhood! Hoogstraat 110, 3011 PV, Rotterdam.

seventees

He is SO good, we could break his fingers in envy... Lennard Schuurmans. Our friend and former class-mate is having a solo exhibition in Amsterdam! Inspired by the seventies he designed 7 t-shirts (SEVENTEES hehe), which are on display in De Kijkkasten, a 'street gallery'. A couple of these shirts are for sale, but in a very very limited edition. Highly recommended!!

Till June 2. Sint Nicolaasstraat (off the Nieuwendijk, next to Hema), Amsterdam.

Wie heiss ist der kaffee?

Finally!!! Dutch Dolls cross something else besides that windy erasmusbridge; THE BORDER. We were asked to take part in an exhibition in Gartenstudio, Berlin, which opens next friday the 17th. I don't know who came up with the idea to make coffee the main subject, but that would be our favourite thing in the world!

As I mentioned before, my screenprinting-equipment is not taking me seriously. Or I should just consider a different career that does not involve screens and paint - jeeezzz. After some very necessary cursing and the impressive launch of a spoon, I managed to produce some good prints. Too bad we can't be there ourselves, but if you're in the neighbourhood, check out that cute studio in Kreuzberg. Which is only the coolest area of Berlin!

Of course, I can't resist posting Siw Malmqvists krautclassic Wie Heiss Ist Der kaffee?

Get it here.

Gartenstudio e.V.i.G.

Nauynstrasse 53

10999 Kreuzberg36 Berlin

Oh screw happiness, let's get doom

On april 4th tegendraads festival will take place for the second time. From 19.00 - 04.00 LVC in Leiden will be transformed into a place for music, art, food and more.

The selection of performing artists is not for the soft-hearted but should be totally surprising and refreshing (which is always a good thing). It's mostly, punk, noise, grindcore, breakcore, doom and well... experimental stuff I guess. So if you're not into that, don't go.

Perhaps you're not into music anyway, and you just like to go shopping. If that is the case, you should check out their HUGE collection of t-shirts, all limited editions and all designed by fellow young artists. Just to name a few awesome ones: Bitches in Control, Ingrid de Lugt, Baschz and Dutch Dolls!