Niels Janssen

My artistic belief is that life in all its aspects is the subject matter of art. All experiences big and small, from the present or the past can find their way into my drawings, as long as they are persistent enough. These experiences-memories, emotions, observations and so on are the building blocks of my compositions. Psychography The word phychography consists of the Greek psyche; mind ,soul, consciousness and grafein; to write, describe, delineate. A precipitation of the mind is a psychograph. To my knowledge this term did not yet exist, but that‘s probably inaccurate. I thought it up -after a brainstorm- because my works are quite often associated with surrealism, but this movement is very much focused on the subconscious, while I also draw and write fully conscious. In the mind all kinds of stuff is constantly battling for priority: The (world)news, memories, associations, emotions, banalities, impulses, inspiring and intimidating examples from art history, the whims of the art world today, politics, the tension between world views, shopping lists, and so on, in arbitrary order. The mind does not have one point of view, concept or emblem, but very many, not seldomly announced in inopportune ways and sometimes grown together. All these memories and impressions stretch way back out in time making the wealth of the consciousness seem almost inexhaustible. As an artist I like to submerge myself in these riches, but also in the creation of a synthesis of all these elements. In the totality of all the elements drawn over and next to each other I try to find an esthetic that is more ‘abstract’. By the multi-layering that grows after I while and by allowing coincidence to play a part -for instance by drawing up side down to lose a sense of representation- new shapes and ideas emerge, but also an ‘abstract’ dynamism. The choices I make to make this dynamism as compelling as possible are made by intuition and I think this is the most fascinating aspect of my work. Intuition, understood as: Acces to knowledge and ability by means unknown.