Cruquius

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolaas_Kruik

 

Bad dream

Cyril Strapatsky is a character with women issues. Here he is having a bad dream. This is done after Matisse obviously. (NOT a personal favorite)

 

Hondsdag's father

After Vallotton.
 

about Titane 2021

 

88 Rue Mouffetard

88 Rue Mouffetard, Paris, was the address of Hans Bellmer and Unica Zuern for 20 years. Both are fascinating artists, albeit not as well-known as other Surrealists. I used a photo of it as reference. It was a rather dilapitated hotel, which was torn down some time in the 1970s.

More on this: https://lesdentslabouche.wordpress.com/2015/06/09/88-rue-mouffetard-remarks-on-an-anagram-by-unica-zurn/
 

Ksenia reads the paper

Ksenia the feral cat-woman has learned to read.

 

 "1½ portrait" (watercolour and coffee on paper, 13x18 cm)

1913 Cityscape

Obviously I used photo reference here (of pre-war Rotterdam) but manipulated beyond recognition. Otherwise, why not just trace or worse, use filtered photos? 

Working on a new storyline involving the role of chance. 

 

“Dead city” ink on paper

 

 “ fire power“  ink on paper 

I’ve been continuing my series of violent art “attack” 2021

 

A study for nothing “ what should never be”

 

New Sketchbook

Painted new characters on the cover of my new sketchbook (#82) My sketches are often in full colour while the finished work is in black & white. I guess that is just me.
 

Hard Times

A winterly scene with street musicians. More new stuff on my new website: https://marcelruijters.wordpress.com/

 

Séance

 

Mano a mano 5

 

Mano a mano 4

 Another variation on the theme of agressive women and men being passive, albeit aroused spectators. It is becoming a bit of a running gag in my stories.

Badminton

What it says on the cover.

 

Good morning

 

Fast Lane

 

Asylum

Sketch after a photo by August Sander.

 

Under the Thumb

'Under the thumb of Sweetwater Communism'. A preliminary drawing of a key scene in my upcoming book, which is set in an imaginary Holland under a communist regime in 1913. The joke of course is that my country is very, very bourgeois and anything remotely resembling a communist takeover has always been out of the question. If there is anything collectivistic about the Dutch, it's the struggle against the seatide and a Protestant work ethic.  I imagine it as a toned-down, jovial kind of surveillance state, based on those values.

 

 

 

Margaux Salmi

 I just sent an invitation to Margaux Salmi. I thought it would be good to see more life in this blog. If you know great artists who would like to post here, tell me.

Locus Solus

The cover of a new sketchbook (No 81). Done with mostly white ink on fake leather. Like always, kept in a raw state for the sake of spontaneity. The male character's name F. Caroussel refers to Raymond Roussel, whose Locus Solus is one of the most bizarre books I have read. There was a Dutch translation of it in the mid-1990s. It must have been a real tour de force to translate from the original french. What I am thinking of now won't be a too obvious pastiche or tribute, but I am delighted with the fact that Locus Solus happens to have been written in 1913, the 'magical' year my recent books take place in.

Roussel was a true eccentric. Heir to a fortune, he could devote his life to writing. He deviced a system based on homonyms (he was french, after all) which led to very strange fiction. Locus Solus is basicly a tour past a series of inventions, demonstrated by their creator, Martial Canterel. These included a stage play of zombies re-enacting key scenes from their past lives and a crane laying out a mosaic of human teeth. Heady stuff from 1913! Roussel also managed the theatre plays of his books, which flopped mercilesly. The world was not ready. The premiere of Locus Solus in The Hague attracted only one visitor - who got his money back. 

While money was not an issue, the lack of recognition was. Roussel grew weirder, isolated himself from the world and died young. You may not know that he was also the man who gave the world the caravan, as he preferred to travel in an exact replica of his living room on wheels.

 

 

 

Invitation

 Hi guys, I've just invited Dominique Lucci on our blog. I realise that I planned to post here about one year ago and still haven't done so. See you later.

Women's Day Special

 

The alegory of the convenant between bourgeoisie and working class

 

The Sniff

 

The Haring Eaters III

 

A streetcar named Desire

Le tram á frottage.