2008 Three Moments Of Time
‘Light at Sea,’ Willemsoord Marine Yard, Den Helder
The vast and impressive buildings of the Marine Yard in Den Helder date back to Napoleon, who wanted to transform the area into the Gibraltar of the North. The enormous windows of the place which I choose to create my contribution to the exhibition, invited me right away to work on the dialogue of space and light.
I began sketching the projections of the windows on the floor and expected to end up with drawings presenting the structural qualities of space through light/dark. However, after the sketches it took a full month to fully complete the works and meanwhile the every day changing position of the sun introduced time into what I was drawing. I decided to stick as much as possible to the original sketches, moving them around each day to cath the original shadows. Of course this proved impossible and created a huge tension within the works. I worked both along with change, and against it.
The finished drawings of the windows were presented opposite the original windows. Space, time and art got entangled. It resulted in an homage to this place with its particular light, its sounds of the breeze and the seagulls outside, and to the work of Rudi van de Wint, the Den Helder artist who struggled to paint light and space, colour and time with such dramatic results.