About

The art of seeing things invisible…

How can we give meaning to the invisible?
We have to make it, we have to create it,
and for that moment, it is art…
the beauty of fragileness.

About me

I started painting in 2014, but have been into multi-disciplinary arts for a long time. I like to see the potential in everything — to make the invisible visible.

In the 1980’s and 1990’s I was an independent all-around producer specialising in location productions for theatre and dance, street theatre, music and visual art. I have a broad range of experience in multi-disciplinary, cross-over and location theatre. I worked in not so typical environments, such as outdoor locations in the streets, at woods and parks, on the beach, and indoor locations such as old churches, barns, warehouses and boathouses. I also had an art gallery in De Pijp area in Amsterdam and was the business manager for promoting various artists. For a time I was also a ship’s cook.

In the late 1990’s I changed stream and worked as the business manager of an IT company for about 10 years. Although I enjoyed the work, it just was not where my passion was. In mid-2009 I decided I wanted to get back to my roots in the art world and started by working at  the Terschellings Oerol Festival, an annual location-specific theatre festival held on the Dutch island Terschelling.

It was when I was re-starting my passion for the arts that a lot changed for me. For an unknown reason my intestines decided to flip up-side-down, which caused severe sepsis and resulted in 3 massive strokes. After fighting for my life and the many months of rehabilitation afterwards, you could say that I have a new perspective and vision for life now, and that includes my new work as a painter.

I’m fluent in Dutch, English and German and conversational in French and Spanish. Feel free to comment or ask questions in any of these languages.

I hope my paintings speak to you — they are my invitation for you to take a peek into my world of art and theater.

About my challenges

Painting has become my new passion, but it is not without it’s challenges. As a result of the strokes I have some disabilities, but I also have some new abilities. I see and experience the world different now and that is also expressed in my paintings.

Some of my challenges are that I lost a lot of motor ability on my left side. This was especially hard for me because I am left-handed, and have needed to relearn to do everything with my right hand, including painting. I also use a wheelchair full time and it’s challenging for me to get out a lot. Previously I could work well at home in my studio or if if the weather was good, also in our shed. Sadly, since we moved to Amsterdam I have been without a studio, which we are desperately looking for.

To make it all even more interesting, my vision was affected by the strokes also. In the beginning, although I could see colour, I could not “feel” colour. It took about 6 months and it was like a light switch being turned on. Painting continues to help a lot with seeing colour, and others have said it gives my paintings and extra intensity in ways that they would normally not see colour.

My visual field has also been affected and I have to work extra hard to compensate for the area that my brain just does not want to process. As you can imagine, it also adds a special dimension to my paintings. To show you what I mean, the photo’s are an example of how most people see a painting with a full vision field, and how I see a painting with a reduced vision field.

I also have a condition known as “neglect”, which means I sometimes ignore my body, my surroundings, and also sometimes people on my left side. It’s much better than it was at the beginning, when I did not even recognise my own left arm and hand — I once said that I wanted to sell them on e-Bay! You may notice that I sometimes express more on the right side of my paintings than on the left side. Painting has helped me a lot to focus more on the left side, and it’s getting better every day.

Both speaking and typing can be very tiring for me, but I will do my best to reply to questions. I also like visits from people and to talk about my paintings, but find it easiest to talk quietly with just one person at a time.

About my paintings

I make paintings because it brings me a lot of joy and it’s my passion. All of my paintings are made with acrylic paint and most paintings have been finished with a gel gloss to protect them, also those on acrylic paper. On stretched canvas paintings I paint the edges so that they can be hung without a frame.

I make all of my paintings now on textured acrylic paper (360 grams), canvas board (cotton) or stretched canvas (cotton). Some of the earlier A4 size paintings were done on heavy water colour paper. The material I work with mostly come from the art supplier van Beek Art Supplies.

I sign all of my paintings on the front with my initial “R”. I used a stamp on the back with the name and date of the painting.

Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist, and this inner life will result in his personal vision of the world.

~ Edward Hopper

About the website developer

The website was developed by Robert’s partner Ellyn Larson. She has worked in the IT field in publishing and content management for many years. She also does all of the fotography for the website and does websites for others. Some of the areas that she focuses on are XML and web content accessibility This website was designed for web accessibility. You may notice rather large text and simple layouts, and that was precisely the goal. For more information see the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). She is also active with accessibility and mobility equipment for people who have had strokes which you can see at www.pitlarson.com/accessibility-equipment and manages a support group for partners of people who have had strokes.