Jan Mankes - giving expression to spiritual life

About this activity.

In close cooperation Museum Arnhem and Museum Belvédère present a diptych exhibition of works by Jan Mankes (1889-1920). This twin exhibition will be shown in both museums from January 25 to June 22 2025. In its exhibition Museum Arnhem focuses on a general view of Mankes’s work, relating it to work by his contemporaries; artists who inspired him and those who in their turn found inspiration in his work. Museum Belvédère mainly concentrates on the work that Mankes made in 1909-1915, the period in which he lived in the Frisian village of  De Knipe and was inspired by the landscape where Museum Belvédère is situated now.

The Frisian years
Jan Mankes, together with his parents, came to live in De Knipe in 1909; it was there that he developed his delicate art of painting. He was inspired by the countryside of Oranjewoud, to be reached by taking the Woudsterweg , which could be seen from the Mankes home. Another inspiring spot was the backyard of the house, where he observed and sketched the birds and other small animals, to translate the preliminary studies into paintings in his studio. Apart from these he made his first self-portraits and portraits of his parents in De Knipe.

The Oranjewoud exhibition provides an insight into the three main themes within Mankes’s work – landscapes, portraits and animals – and his artistic development up to 1915, the year he marries Anne Zernike and exchanges De Knipe for The Hague.

Oscar Voch – whispers
As a complement to the exhibition Jan Mankes - giving expression to spiritual life we show whispers, with work by a present day soulmate of Jan Mankes: the Dutch artist Oscar Voch (1962). In his digital photographic work the artist shows kindred quiet images and modest still lives, filled with a similar timelessness.

Voch’s photographic work is based on graphics, painting and photography. With the aid of a computer he combines images made by hand and by camera in digital works of art with a singular poetic atmosphere, filled with mysticism and melancholy. His photographic work is mostly the result of many preliminary studies and an endless search for stillness, expressiveness and mood. A monography will be brought out together with the exhibition.

Museum Belvédère.

Location.

Museum Belvédère
Oranje Nassaulaan 12
8448 MT Heerenveen
www.museumbelvedere.nl/nl/