BRAM VAN VELDE, his quotes on painting art and life; + biography story of the Dutch-born painter-artist
Bram van Velde (1895 – 1981), his quotes on painting. Bram van Velde was a Dutch painter artist living mainly in France and famous for his abstract, often colored abstract painting style. A huge inspiration was the painting art of Matisse; mainly Matisse’s still life’s inspired Van Velde in the 1930’s… Van Velde worked and lived most of his life time in France, Paris where he got connected with the writer Samuel Beckett. His painting art resides somewhere between abstract expressionism, Ecole de Paris and Surrealism; in the 1960s it evolved into an expressive and colorful abstract art, intuitively created. At the bottom art links for biography facts about Bram van Velde and his abstract painting art, with some useful art links. – the editor.
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Bram van Velde: untitled painting, 1956 |
Bram van Velde, his artist quotes on painting art, life and on his friend Samuel Beckett
– Part of your work feels as clear, it gives you a sense of liberation or beauty and you recognize it as necessary pavements. You are thus in a sense ready. In the other part of your work this is not the case. Therein is the hidden development, which is the true essence of art… …the higher purpose, the pursuit forward that art automatically calls. The unclear part of your work needs to progress [stopping is no option, is no life, no art] and it is clear when by working with head and heart, the real step forward has been achieved.
* Bram van Velde, source of artist quotes on art & life: letter to B. Kramers, 1926, as quoted in ‘Bram van Velde, A Tribute’, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994, p. 18. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– About Van Gogh… …a man who is on fire, a torch. His sincerity is absolute. His best painting is the grain field where he kills himself. There we find ourselves at the border of the art of painting. We cannot go further.
* source of artist quotes on art & life: ”Je peins l’Impossibilité de peindre”, by M. Nuridsany, newspaper Le Figaro, 24-10-1989, p. 35.
– Paris with its multitude of art directions calls continuously to the deepest penetration and recognition of your inner essence. Only in this way it is possible to create work that refers the time span.
* source of artist quotes on art & life in Paris: letter to H. E. Kramer, 25-10-1926, as quoted in ‘Bram van Velde, A Tribute’, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994, p. 44.
– …art is not for the personal satisfaction of one or the other, but art wants to return all what’s in life… … Art wants to give back everything what’s in our lives. The more comprehensive the artist stands in life the more powerful his work will speak, and therefore a work of art is a measure of the mental size of his creator.
* artist quotes on art & the artist: letter to H. E. Kramer, 25-10-1926, as quoted in ‘Bram van Velde, A Tribute’, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994, p. 44.
– The real world with its common logic pushes us toward catastrophe. The artists seek in his work to free himself from this weight. Art is being transformed into politics, love into trade, education into an apparatus for stifling the mind. In the midst of such horrors, clearly only the dream within me has life. But how do other people live? -There is color, virginal expression – new, without a cage, without routine, without limit, a bath of sun and light. We must realize that nothing man does is of any value. The trouble is that people want to be paid. Only sick men can be artists. Their suffering pushes them into the accomplishment of deeds which reinvest the world with meaning. The sensitive man or the artist can only be a sick man in our civilized life, so full of lies. To think of art as a profession, how appealing! – Painting is man in the face of his downfall.
* source of artist quote on artist and the world: “Abstract Painting”, Michel Seuphor, Dell Publishing Co., 1964, p. 134.
– It was truly revealing. The strength of the intervention, the intensity of colors and the happiness of this work, has never left me. (a remark in 1977, about the painting ‘Piano lesson’ of Henri Matisse, Van Velde saw around 1925 for the first time in his life, fh) .
* artist quote on the painting art of Matisse: article ‘Schilder Bram van Velde in Dordrecht’, by Paul Groot, newspaper NRC Handelsblad, 1979.
– I met Beckett at my brother’s place (the painter Geer van Velde, fh). That was a Big meeting, in capital letters. It was before war started (before 1940 in Paris, fh), life was still normal. That time I was very lonely. We saw each other often. Before the war he had published already something, but his fame came in 1953. We never spoke about his work. He was a taciturn man. Sometimes a word escaped from his mouth. Sure, a word you would never forget. It would stick in your head… …This friendship with (Samuel) Beckett is the most important experience in my life. He was fully alive for my way of working. What he could express in words, I did with my paintings. (remark in 1977, about his contact with the writer Beckett in Paris before and during the War, fh)..
* source of artist quote on art & life with Beckett in Paris: article ‘Schilder Bram van Velde in Dordrecht’, by Paul Groot, newspaper NRC Handelsblad, 1979. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– My work is independent of my will. My best works are created when driven by an inner strength. This has nothing to do with my will. It is that immediate spontaneity of my intense way of living that makes the difference between my work and a lot of other artists who make art works with their mind.
* artist quote on his art and & life: letter to H. E. Kramer, 14-11-1927, as quoted in Bram van Velde, A Tribute, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994, p. 46. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– I’m now in a big working period, which takes me up so much that hardly anything of me remains. I have never been strong in theories and this becomes worse and worse. My work should give me satisfaction, and that is about life and death… … Several paintings full of life and beauty arose again and give me the courage and joy to proceed on the road. There are also several paintings in which I am involved for less than half, discharges in a short time, which have existence for a while, but will not reach shaping.
* source of artist quote on creating his art: letter to H. E. Kramer, 28-07-1929, as quoted in ‘Bram van Velde, A Tribute’, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994.
– When I am painting, driven by lively tensions, I want to express what’s going on in me. When that tension has ceased, when the life in me became visible, then something happened which had to happen. Over and over again you experience a work which is created in this way. What happened? It is hard to say, because it was not my mind that led but the inner desire that revealed its inner life.
* artist quote from a: letter to H.P. Bremmer, 17-11-1930, City archive Den Haag, as quoted in Bram van Velde, A Tribute, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994, p. 50.
– Life and mind are continuously in conflict with each other. I want happiness, security. I won’t reach that by considerations of my mind; on the contrary they will lead to a certain despair of the inner person. Not what he thinks engages the artist, but what he feels.
* source of artist quote: letter to H.P. Bremmer, 17-11-1930, city archive The Hague, as quoted in Bram van Velde, A Tribute, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994.
– A painter is someone who can’t use words. His only escape is to be a seer.
– Painting is so stupid, so simple. I paint to get out of the through. I paint my misery.
– Artists don’t live in the everyday world. That’s why people think they’re an odd bunch.
– The most difficult thing is when you can’t do anything. When you just have to wait.
(November 9, 1965)
* artist quote and statement on the task of th painter in art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 54.
– The most difficult thing is not to want anything.
– Everything has to end before it can begin.
– You are in constant danger of being destroyed.
– I can’t say anything. There are no words.
– The important thing is to be nothing.
– The less you think, the better it is.
– The more you know, the less you are.
– The beauty other people create is not for the artists. Artists have to live alone.
– Everyone cheats. Only artists don’t. They don’t fool people and they aren’t fooled. They are outside all that. Nobody can understand them.
– Painting is an eye, a blinded eye that continues to see, and sees what blinds it… …this tiny little thing, which is nothing, which dominates life.
(October 31, 1966)
* his artist quote and statement on painting and the beauty: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 58.
– Picasso… … the master….being a master…..I don’t search, I find (one of the most famous quotes of Picasso, where he criticize the ‘searching’ artists, fh) ….the master, the mastery……Producing, producing……..He only knows how to work, can’t do anything else. What lost souls!
– The great risk is producing for its own sake. You must never force things. You just have to wait.
(October 31, 1966)
* statement on Picasso’s art: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 59. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– In the first piece that Beckett (the famous novel writer, fh) wrote about me (circa 1946), he never once used the word color. That was important. I was struck by it.
– To be true, you have to take the plunge, to touch bottom. But most people want to be in control. They fear the worst. You can’t control anything. What you have to do is let yourself be taken over…. …All the paintings I have made, I was compelled to make. You must never force yourself.
– They make you and you have no say in it. It’s Godot (French famous moviemaker, fh) all the time. A chain around your neck and the whip cracking behind you.
– Yes, I abandoned everything. Painting required it. It was all or nothing.
– Painting is being alive. Through my painting, I beat back this world that stops us living and where we are in constant danger of being destroyed… …No, you have to know when to keep silent.
(December 31, 1966)
* his artist statement creating art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign pp. 60-61.
– Painting is an aid to vision. It turns life, the complexity of life, into something visible. It reveals things that we don’t know how to see.
(April 2,1967)
* statements on painting art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 62.
– Mondrian? His mind was too subtle. He worked in the light. I work in the darkness.
– Mondrian is the Buddha of painting. I saw him once. You wondered how a man could radiate such charisma.
(April 2,1967)
* his artist quote on Mondrian’s art: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 62
– I’m trying to see, when everything in this world conspires to prevent us from seeing.
– I paint the impossibility of painting.
– In this world that destroys me, the only thing that I can do is to live my weakness. That weakness is my only strength.
– The artist is living a secret that he has to make manifest
– I can’t say or explain anything. Pictures don’t come from your head but from life… …I am always looking for life. All that escapes thought or will-power.
(April 2,1967)
* his quotes and statements on painting art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 62.
– When you cross any border there is always an uneasy moment when you feel yourself automatically an enemy. Artists don’t belong to any group or country.
– When you are living the truth, the world no longer exists, events become unimportant. But the way of truth is not easy… …if you are on the side of truth, you have no power. That’s why you are always defeated. The power, all the power, is on the side of the world.
I have been completely absorbed in my adventure. No country, no family, no ties. I didn’t exist anymore. I just had to press on.
(April 2,1967)
* his artist quote thruth in art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 62. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– Life is so difficult to catch.
– Each time it’s an attempt to get there. To get to see. To get where you can see.
– Through painting I try to get closer to nothingness, to the void.
– The artist is the bearer of life.
– Life is wrecked by living.
(September 14, 1967)
* artist quotes and statements on art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 63.
– Oh Baudelaire (French 19th century poet and art critic, fh)…. He used to be enormously important to me. It’s thanks to him that I was able to get through the war (in Paris, during 1940 – 1945 Van Velde had a long and painful break, with only a few paintings he finished, fh). A true loyal mind without hypocrisy. The most universal spirit. The greatest Frenchman. I have always been much less interested in painters (than Baudelaire, a great surprise to hear for Charles Juliet the interviewer, fh) .
(September 14, 1967)
* artist quote on art & life in Paris: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 66.
– Of course painting is ridiculous. But it’s the only way I’ve got to get closer to life.
– An artist’s life is all very fine and moving. But only in retrospect. In books.
– Artists who are the defenders of true life become phonies. That’s the perfidious thing about this world. Society turns anyone with a bit of life inside them into a medical case.
– I don’t like talking. I don’t like people talking to me.. Painting is silence.
– A painter is somebody who sees. I paint the moment when I set out. When I set out to see. And it’s the same thing for the viewer. When he approaches the canvas, he is advancing towards an encounter. The encounter with vision.
(September 14, 1967)
* his artist quotes and statements on painting: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 67.
– There’s a perpetual duel going on between the world of the spirit and the world of things. Although the one only has meaning in relation to the other.
– Most people’s lives are governed by willpower. An artist is someone who has no will.
– To be nothing. Just nothing. It’s a frightening experience. You have to let go of everything.
– At is taking risks… … a sincere attempt to achieve the impossible, the unknown.
(December 28, 1967)
* quotes and statements on being an artist in life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 68.
– I am in the void. Nothing to hang on to.
– Waiting for the truth.
– . Van Gogh…. Fascinating. The fragility of that strong spirit.
– There’s always doubt. There’s nothing you can get hold of.
– Each of my paintings is a cycle. It’s like existence, life. They are always in motion.. If they were fixed and static, they would be false.
– When you get to the bottom, you discover that there is no room for pride. That’s what I paint.
(December 28, 1967)
* his artist quotes and statements on creating paintings: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 69. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– Painting doesn’t interest me… …What I paint is beyond painting.
– I am powerless, helpless. Each time it’s a leap in the dark. A deliberate encounter with the unknown.
– I don’t set out to speak a comprehensible language. But my language is authentic.
– Each painting contains so much suffering.
– When I look back to a recent painting, I can hardly bear th suffering in it.
– Each painting is linked to a fundamental drama.
– I have to try to see where seeing is no longer possible, where visibility is gone.
– Yes, perhaps there is some enjoyment in it too, somewhere.
(April 13, 1968)
* his artist quotes and statements on his recent painting: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 70.
– Doubt is at the root. Since Van Gogh, doubt has increased. Now, pain is the only source.
– When there is nothing, you begin to see a cycle.
– When the worst is avoided, sonething’s wrong somewhere.
(November 2, 1968)
* his artist quotes on art & doubt: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 71.
– I see it all …. With a kind of panic. But somehow it all comes together again and I feel that I am not so very different from them.
– Yes, I have always lived a very solitary life.
It’s so strange, this need to see and make others see… …if it weren’t for this spark (his need, to be, to see and to make others see, red.) it would all be just dust. But in the end there are plenty of people who are drawn to that spark.
(April 1, 1969)
* artist quote: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 72.
– The most fantastic thing is that everything happens in isolation from the will. Wanting doesn’t come into it.
– Through wanting to transcend he (some writer, fh) has ended up leaving life behind.
– French painting …. So often it lacks a certain savagery.
– So many artists end up playing a part, identifying with a fictional character. They are no longer part of the adventure.
(October 26, 1969)
* his artist statement on art & will: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 73.
– discussing the canvas Bram van Velde is working on:
– As you’ve seen, I am still a long way from… …But I am trying to get closer to it. Sometimes that’s all you can hope for. But the process of getting closer obviously has something sacred about it.
– We are always two people. On living and one dead. And the two are in constant conflict.
– This illumination you sometimes achieve isn’t something you can hang on to. In fact, you lose it again right away. Each time, you have to set out to look for it again.
– It is difficult to keep the whole thing in focus.
(October 26, 1969)
* his artist quotes and statements discussing hiss painting: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 73. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– Perhaps he (the Dutch painter Mondrian, fh) was too faithful to a single discovery. And perhaps that kind of painting was right for the period. But now (1970, fh) peace and harmony are no longer possible. There is only anguish.
Van gogh?… …In this world of petty calculations, he was too intense. He frightened people. They cast him out.
(July 16, 1970)
* Bram van Velde on the Dutch painter Mondrian and his art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 77.
– What makes a painting fascinating is its sincerity. Sincerity is such a rare thing. Most people don’t dare to be sincere.
– Because it’s an adventure out of all proportion. You have to devote all your strength to it and it’s never enough.
(August 24, 1970)
* artist quote on art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 78.
– It is true that other people can help you, and to lasting effect…. …If I hadn’t had Beckett in 1940 (in Paris when Van Velde was strongly demoralized, fh), I’m not sure I could have stood it. I am really not sure…. …At that time he (Beckett, fh) he was driven by an extremely aggressive and fiery Irish spirit. That has lessened as tim has gone on… …I don’t know anywhere in modern art any more faithful or more impressive picture of contemporary humanity than the one he offers us in ‘The Unamable’.
(August 24, 1970)
* his artist quotes and statements on art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 79. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
– some remarks on painting:
– I am well aware that a painting must inevitably be a bizarre, incomprehensible thing.
– I start off on the canvas and, little by little, it imposes its own solution. But that solution is not easy to find.
– A painting is not a battle against other people, but against oneself.
– Painting, an oeuvre, is not such a big deal, it is so unimportant. But that’s precisely what makes it interesting.
– I don’t know if I’ve got close enough (in two recent paintings h made, fh) to what I was really trying to achieve. But at least I’ve tried, I’ve made the attempt. I’ve done what I could. I’ve gone as far as my powers permitted.
(November 2,1970)
* statements on art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 79.
– If these gouaches (he recently made, fh) live at all, it is because they are true, they derive from life. They are born of the unknown – and not of habit or know-how, or intention, or of some recipe… …there comes a time when serious work is no longer an effort. When demanding work of that kind no longer tires you.
– However terrible it is, the thing never involves any sadness
– It is important to see that my paintings are ultimately stimulating. They are not at all the kind of thing that inspires despair.
(November 1,1971)
* artist quote on his art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign pp. 84-85.
– You have to sever yourself from this world, this life we lead.
– Painting is getting in touch with the truth. It’s a matter of summoning up the vision I need.
– You are in an area where knowledge fails. Where you have to advance in ignorance, not even knowing where you are going.
– An oeuvre is like a chain; you manufacture it link by link.
– When you go a long way away, you necessarily distance fyourself from other people. But in the intervals between work, you do to some extent rejoin the human world.
Those who love the thing are not free. It’s people who don’t love it who can afford to do what they like.
– The real horror is mass production. Painting when there is no compulsion to do so… …Pictures like that are all unpunished crimes.
(April 3,1972)
* several short artist quotes and statements on art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 86.
– When you are working, you are so far away and so absorbed, it’s inevitable that you fall into a vacuum when you stop… …every time when I finish a painting, I always have to wait to get my strength back before I can begin another.
(April 3,1972)
* quote on creating art in life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 87.
– I am in a thousand pieces. Painting somehow makes me whole.
– Painting lives only through the slide towards the unknown in oneself.
– The world of architecture – and of works conceived for architecture – tends towards beauty. True beauty tends towards ugliness and panic.
(May,1972)
* statements on painting: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign p. 87.
– My pictures suggest things but never state them. They don’t attempt to persuade or to prove anything.
– My picture are also an annihilation.
– Creating a painting is a matter of ensuring that all its parts achieve unity. Though it’s a precarious, fragile unity.
– Something is trying to come into th world. But I don’t know what it is. I never start by knowing. It’s impossible to know . truth is not knowledge.
– A painting is a kind of miracle.
– The canvas allows me to make the invisible visible.
– I need to go towards the illogical. This world we live in destroys us. It is always governed by the same laws. You have to create images that don’t belong to it. That are totally different from those it presents us.
– The greatest moment is when you realize that the painting you’ve just finished is nothing. When you manage to detach yourself from it.
– Mondrian…..The constructivists?……. They had certainties. They wanted a stable basis to work on, but I’m afraid that that was enormous arrogance on their part. Nothing is stable and no certainties are possible.
– Painting is a bit like witchcraft.
– What the eye can see won’t get us very far. And what it can see is so limited, so restricted. But a gouache or an oil painting can be seen at a glance, can take in a whole world at a single glance.
(August 11, 1972)
* several artist quotes and statements on art & life: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign pp. 90-91.
– I think there is a degree of primitivism in what I do… …You have to see without illusions. Without trying to protect yourself.
– There is only the present. A painting is an instant of tim that has escaped oblivion.
– I feel myself tied to life. To the immensity and complexity of life. Each painting is an impulse towards life.
(August 29, 1972)
* his artist quote on art & time: from ‘Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde’, ed. Charles Juliet, First Dalkey Archive edition, 2009, London and Champaign pp. 92-93. (Dutch painter, famous for his abstract colored paintings in a expressive abstract style; some art links & biography facts at the bottom)
Bram van Velde, art links for biography of the Dutch artist & art images of his abstract paintings
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