Parts of larger installations

Pleased

One of the best things about writing this blog is the enthusiasm of Marlies' family and friends and their contributions in the form of memories and photos of works in their collection.

I was particularly happy to see several items that were part of the two large installations Marlies did in the 1980s and 1990s.

Floor piece from 1983

In 1983, Marlies covered a floor in the Beyerd in Breda with 903 clay hand grips. Some where white, some had writing on them, forming a cross pattern within the white square.

The Bourequat brothers

Another large-scale work from the 1990s was dedicated to the Bourequat brothers, who were unjustly imprisoned in Tazmamart for many years.

Marlies showed it at the TB Gallery in Etten-Leur in a joint exhibition with her great friend Klaartje Scheer.

Klaartje told me that the work of Marlies consisted of a series of large, dark panels of chamotte clay (one for each year the brothers were imprisoned) and a wall of white masks, each showing a different small deformation.

Surviving pieces

Annerie Teuling's collection includes both a mask from the Bourequat exhibition and a hand grip from the floor piece.

Klaartje also owns one of these hand grips, so now I only need to find the other 901!

Marlies' niece Denneke owns several masks that are currently being cleaned and will be ready to be photographed soon.

The photos below of Annerie Teuling's collection were taken by Jessie Hocks. Thank you so much again, Jessie!

The dog forms a pair with the dog owned by Marlies' niece. It would be great to exhibit them together.

The Easter bunny - made in clay from an old chocolate mold - looks great! Marlies also loved sugar animals, so this one fits right in.

From Floor Piece 1983

Collection Annerie Teuling

Clay is cool 2.

Jessie Hocks, the daughter of Annerie Teuling and Teun Hocks, kindly sent me a photo of the missing Marlies sheet from my Artoteek folder. Many thanks for that!

Also pictured in this beautiful photo is one of two almost identical dogs, one owned by Marlies' niece and one by Annerie Teuling. This means we can date the pair to the mid-eighties.

Marlies van Wijk

Photo Marius Klabbers

Every dog has its day

These two come from the home of another of Marlies' nieces - Denneke's sister. Thanks a lot for sharing them!

They are playful and happy:

Breda friends

Most of the artists who worked in Breda in the seventies and eighties were friends and participated in each other's exhibitions.

They also collaborated on projects such as the Galerie de Luxe, a shoebox-sized gallery founded by Teun Hocks.

This work by Sef Peeters from the mid-seventies is one of these collaborations, a wonderful example of mail art. I am publishing it here because it also features Annerie Teuling, who signs her card as Annerie Hocks. Also adding to the work are Teun Hocks, Harrie de Kroon, Pieter Laurens Mol and Moniek Toebosch.

Another set of these cards is kept in the Stedelijk Museum Breda. 

In Bed

This is probably one of Marlies's earliest works. It comes from the collection of Marius Boender, who kindly shared his photos with me.

Marlies and Marius Boender got together after she returned from Japan in the early 1970s.

Mr Boender points out that Marlies made it using a mold of a real, small mattress.

According to him the work should be viewed in the context of hyperrealism and the art of Claes Oldenburg, which were popular in the early 1970s. The spirit of the times is also evident in the piece.

Mr Boender only just saved the work in time, as Marlies had almost thrown it away after they moved house.

Clay is cool

These great portraits of Tjitske Dijkstra and Annerie Teuling are very much of the 1980s.

They were included in a folder published by the Artoteek in Breda in 1985, containing fifteen loose sheets about fifteen ceramic artists.

I wish I could publish Marlies' portrait as well, but unfortunately, that sheet is the only one missing from my copy! See No. 28 for a xerox of the front of the Marlies sheet from Geer Pouls's collection.

Tjitske Dijkstra

Annerie Teuling

Tjitske Dijkstra, photo Peer van der Kruis

Annerie Teuling, photo Teun Hocks

Inspired by an event of no significance

Introduction

Some of Marlies' works are in the possession of family and friends. Denneke, a niece of Marlies, shares her memories of her aunt and photos of the works she owns here.

Thank you so much, Denneke, for your great story and the beautiful pictures! 

The work of Marlies means a lot to me

I often think about the beautiful works of Marlies and how delicate and small she made them.

Perhaps it was the unplanned element (putting small pieces in the kiln whenever there was some leftover space) that led to the most beautiful results.

Then again, there's that finely sculpted little animal.

Inspiration from Japan

Marlies read haikus, and the Japanese influence was noticeable everywhere she lived.

The garden at her house on the Baronielaan was so beautiful. She had 'green foam', as she called it, growing everywhere. It flowed over the ground almost like a river.

That little plant is called 'baby's tears'. I still plant it in my own small garden.

‘In winter it turns brown,’ she would say, ‘and then, in spring, hop, it starts living again.’

Thick, big boulders lay at the back of the garden with that green blanket flowing next to them. In the front yard, she had East Indian cress growing over bamboo on the ground, like Matisse.

It was like a square carpet of flowers. I always enjoyed seeing Marlies’s home, wherever she lived.  She had great taste.

A poem by Ling Yu

Last month in Trouw (21 June 2025) Rob Schouten reviewed a collection of poems by Ling Yu (Inspired by an event of no significance). Ling Yu is Chinese, not Japanese, but nevertheless I was reminded of Marlies for a moment.

I think it's a beautiful poem:

Myself, My Train, and You

3.

Today would be hard to describe as blessed - 

Cold damp air, no hunger in the gut

 

Could be worse. The sky looks dusky, dimmed down

As if retreating to the eighteenth century

Having no radio. No lightbulb

Chilly drafts left by the night watchman

Lantern shaded in red. Wilted almond petals falling

Kindling set alight, boil a bowlful of thin noodles-

Ink stone frozen in the master's study

Careless servant sent away

To borrow a fiber-tip pen

In the twenty-first century

He stumbled upon a new name

Tried on a pair of jogging shoes

The master would not recognize

Ling Yu (translation Denis Mair)

A group of masks

A pensive mouse

Bowl (see No. 50)

Two goblets (see No. 17)

The Cheops group

Kindred spirits

Cheops was formed in 1985, when ceramists Marja Hooft, Rob Brandt, Tjitske Dijkstra, Michel Kuipers and Jan van Leeuwen started working together.

They agreed to continue as a group for at least five years, aiming to bring some fresh air to the stuffy world of Dutch ceramics.

After the death of Jan van Leeuwen in 1992, the group disbanded.

Although Marlies was never a member of Cheops, her friends and colleagues Tjitske Dijkstra and Rob Brandt were. 

Some of Cheops' principles, such as a certain looseness and experimentation in their work, as well as an informal use of materials, can also be seen in Marlies's work.

A Cheops coincidence in Dordrecht

'Cheops' is also the name of a rare book shop in Dordrecht.

I had always associated that name with the famous poem by J.H. Leopold.

When I picked up a set of postcards there,  featuring works by Breda artists from the 1980s (see the Tjitske Dijkstra card below), I found out there was actually a very personal link with the Cheops ceramists' group as well.

It turned out that the bookseller's wife was the sister of Tjitske Dijkstra. Marleen Dijkstra kindly showed me several of her sister's works, including a beautiful vase looking very similar to the one on the Eindhoven poster I have shared here before.

Friends and colleagues

It would be great to feature some work by her good friends Tjitske Dijkstra and Annerie Teuling in the upcoming Marlies exhibition.

Although these three artists never formed an official group, they were very close and studied and worked together, which provides a valuable insight into each other's work.

Tjitske Dijkstra, pot hoekig klein (1986)

A Cheops exhibition in Breda in 1988

This poster of the Cheops exhibition at the Beyerd Museum in Breda gives a good impression of the kind of work they did:

Design: Karel Kruijsen

The accompanying catalogue by Sonja Herst, Bertie Stips-van Weel and Ruud Kaulingfreks contains a lot of interesting information (32 pages, Cultureel Centrum de Beyerd, 1988). 

From Zwolle to Leeuwarden

In 1997, the remaining members of the group donated the majority of their works to the Stedelijk Museum Zwolle. In 2021, it was decided to move the collection to a more suitable location: the Keramiekmuseum Princessehof in Leeuwarden.