When I Was You

The Chabot Museum manages an extensive collection of paintings and sculptures by the Rotterdam-based artist Henk Chabot (1894–1949). Characteristic of Chabot’s work is a humanistic view of humanity, an important quality that the museum also recognises in many works from the contemporary art collection of psychotherapists Annelies and Bob van Eerd. From their collection, an exhibition has been assembled featuring contemporary Dutch art in which human existence and attention to one’s fellow human being take centre stage.

Hannah van Bart paints compelling, rich, and complex portraits. They do not depict real people, but imagined figures, characters that take shape through the act of painting itself. In the oil paintings and watercolours of Marc Mulders, expressive colours and brushstrokes evoke beauty as well as multiple symbolic, spiritual, and philosophical meanings. In Elly Strik’s work When I Was You, two figures encounter one another in a garden-like setting. The exhibition shows inspiring encounters in art.

Cover image: Elly Strik, When I Was You | photo: Guy L’Heureux