Gertjan Scholte Albers Dutch, b. 1971

Gertjan Scholte-Albers (1971, Valthermond) studied at the Aki Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Enschede. While still a student, Scholte-Albers decided to swap painting in a studio for the rich experience of painting outdoors. For more than twenty years now, he has been setting off on his scooter, not to brave the elements, but to use them to fuel his experience of the landscape that stretches out before him. "I experience the changing atmosphere, the direct light and the enormous space. They give me a feeling of joy."

He paints in the woods or on the Groningen Hoge Land, where he has lived with his family since 1999. He translates his experiences of nature into large formats with idiosyncratic colour harmonies, which he himself calls ‘an urge to satisfy the joy of my eye’. His appearance, together with his cart, is reminiscent of an action painting by Jackson Pollock. Artist, paint, canvas and cart merge completely into the landscape that he paints in his inimitable way.

Although trees dominate his work, there are also panoramas of meadows, villages and the sea. They may appear to be painted more realistically than the sometimes almost fluorescent tree landscapes, but according to Scholte-Albers, they are created with the same feeling. "That feeling is ultimately a deep sense of awe for creation. When I see the diversity of those trees, the animals I hear or see, I am overcome by a kind of shiver. How old is all this, how many times has spring, autumn and winter come and gone? That feeling cannot be put into words. I can only paint it," says Gertjan Scholte-Albers.