Jan de Graaf

Jan de Graaf (1948) makes bronze sculptures in which he preferably impersonates women and children. He finds his inspiration in his vicinity such as playing children in the street, people who are talking or someone walking his dog. In most cases, there is a stylized structure and design of the figures. The images are often to understand in one glance. The straight weedy legs and the remarkably flat bodies creates an overall rigidity that characterize the styling of Jan de Graaf. Demure, silent, frozen, without any suggestion of a movement that possibly proceded the standing pose or is yet to come.

Jan de Graaf is able to link beauty to familiarity, with sense of humor, but also for tenderness. In the finishing Jan de Graaf proves his great skill. His work makes a funny impression, but he considers himself, in his sense of form and craftsmanship, as extremely serious. His figures have their own character, as it were well-educated personalities.

Striking about the sculptures of Jan de Graaf is the fact that he sometimes paints the smooth bronze surface. The painting usually proposes a garment tight around the body: the dress of a woman or a child's shirt. The voluminous bathers, the girl with the birds, the stiff ballerinas and the child on a rocking horse, by their humor or their irony they all do elicit a smile.

Jan de Graaf studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.