Good and Evil, 2011

Because Barbara Broekman increasingly develops stronger ideas about good and evil, fair and unfair, as she is aging, she has decided to use this as a theme in her new series. In Good and Evil she explicitly pays attention to the good and evil of human actions.

For the representation of good and evil Broekman goes back to the myths and legends of classical antiquity. She used fragments from paintings in which incidents, acts, personifications and persons that can be associated with good and evil from these classical stories are depicted. These fragments are extracted from paintings of baroque masters. Emotions are enlarged and emphasized in this movement. It’s all about passion, violence, fear, harmony and serenity. This fits Broekman well, because human emotions play an important role in her oeuvre. Moreover, the formal themes like movement, action of light and three-dimensionality in a flat surface are typical both of the baroque and the work of Broekman.

Broekman has selected and copied relevant artworks from art books. Based on fragments from these artworks two collages have been made, that stand for Good and for Evil respectively. Both collages form the basis for Jacquard woven ‘paintings’, digital-printed carpets, and little tables laminated with a digital print. 

The woven ‘paintings’ have the monumental size of 300 x 420 cm each. However, each work is made up of 35 Jacquard woven pieces of 60 x 60 cm, stretched on frames. Each piece can be bought separately. One can compose one’s own artwork by combining two of more pieces according to one’s own insight. The works are also available in a smaller size, made up of woven pieces of 30 x 30 cm.