Paula: We met in 1994 when we were both studying at the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten in Arnhem (now called ArtEZ). I graduated as a drawing teacher and Klaas as a handicrafts teacher. After graduating in 1996, we started looking for an affordable place to live and thus ended up in Bierum.
Klaas: "I ended up at Academy Minerva pretty soon after as a metal workshop specialist and Paula worked a lot in education. She resigned in 2012 and since then she has been self-employed in art education, all the while focusing on her own art practice.
P: We only started working together as artists in the past few years since our youngest child left home. We've been together for 30 years now, and twenty-five of those years the relationship was mostly about our children. After such a long time, you can't immediately pick up where we left off before the kids. So much has happened in that time and you have to get to know each other again.
K: To make art together, you have to be able to articulate things very well. When you work alone, you intuitively know what you're looking for, but when you explain an idea to someone else, the framework has to be clear, no matter how nebulous the idea, otherwise you won't get there.
P: Twenty years ago, we couldn't have worked together. We didn't have the peace or patience for that then. At that time, you are still very much engaged in your own development and the relationship between two people at an early stage is very different from thirty years later.
K: You also have to be generous to each other in a collaboration like this. Sometimes one comes up with an idea and then sometimes you have to step over your own internalised dogmas a bit and go along with it. You are all the time probing how each thinks about different topics. You really have to listen to each other and get to know each other again.
P: A lot has happened over all these years and this has been a good way to see how each is now in life. We started this collaboration to be able to move forward together. If we can do this, then we can do anything. It's nice to work together. We have enormous fun but at the same time we are also very critical of each other.
K: It has been a flywheel for us. People don't realise how precarious relationships are. Many couples break up as soon as the last child leaves the nest or others stay together out of misery. This is sometimes not talked about enough and we want to change that. Besides, mid-career artists receive little attention anyway and the focus is mainly on young artists. But they will be talking about very different things from us, and focusing on such a narrow section of the creative field creates an equally narrow discussion.
P: The topics we talk about shift as we work. When we started, it was mainly about ourselves, but gradually more and more comes up. In a performance of ours where we walk into the water, we realised that we are at a point in our lives where we are mirrored on both sides. On one side you have our children who are predominantly still at the beginning of life and on the other side are our parents and we are somewhere in the middle. It is very confronting to realise where you are in life. Especially when we discuss our works with our children and parents, you notice that time spirits change very much through the generations and usually for the better. It has brought us very emotional moments that also really brought us together.
K: We mainly use performance, or make a video recording of it, because everyone can relate to it given everyone has a body. It has a veracity and immediacy that no other medium has. As a staff member at Academy Minerva, I have seen a lot passing by, but performance still touches me the most. The authenticity of it touches me and that's why I love using it for our works because for me it's the closest thing to real life.
P: I actually find video very uncomfortable as a medium because it very much confronts you with old age. The artworks force us to process our own lives; you see how your face has changed through all those years, how your movements are affected by the repercussions of all the years. Having a child leaves its mark and life an sich leaves its mark on your body. You are forced to face reality. I'm not 20 years old anymore, but I wouldn't want to go back either. You accumulate so much knowledge, experience and skill. You don't want to surrender that anymore.
K: You wouldn't want to be the unsuspecting sucker from thirty years ago anymore. That was fun once, but I'd rather be where I am now.
The exhibition Time under Construction can be seen in Pictura until May 26, 2024, with work by Paula Biemans and Klaas Kloosterhuis. On Sunday, May 26, the Letter to You performance will take place continuously in the Bovenzaal from 3:00 PM to 5:00 PM, followed by the finissage of the exhibition.
Text: Dinnis van Dijken
Photos: Lisa Jasperina Bommerson