Michael de Kök

My paintings are images of landscapes in the literal sense of the term, since they are transpositions of visual memory. They are either inspired by my immediate surroundings, or former travels, and triggered by my initial experience of light, or its absence, at the moment of inception.

I find a need to contemplate nature. It is through nature's contemplation that I find silence, harmony and a lack of constraint.

By revisiting the same memory repeatedly, the image in my mind is edited, refined and purified, leaving the barest essential elements. It is only by going through this filtering process that the image eventually becomes "paintable" and can be rendered on canvas.