World Fine Art Professionals and their Key-Pieces, 475 - Maaike Koning

 

World Fine Art Professionals and their Key-Pieces, 475 – Maaike Koning
Maaike Koning (48) got cancer and wondered where it would end. “Do I still have a chance to grow old?” She was treated for two types of cancer for more than three years and lived between hope and despair.
She decided to write to record the process of waiting in uncertainty. The texts were accompanied by photos and collages, because Maaike is a photographer.
I speak with Maaike a week after the opening of the exhibition ‘WACHT AF’ (Wait and see) in the WM Gallery.

How did it start?
“In the summer of 2017 I suddenly felt very tired. During a walk in the dunes I was no longer able to get to the top of a dune. I went to the doctor, who was shocked. He noted anemia and a very high inflammatory value. He sent me to the hospital. A CT scan was made there. They subsequently discovered no tumor. So it had to be something different, one investigation followed another. After six months they discovered on a new scan that there was a tumor behind my breastbone, which had been overlooked the first time. Unfortunately, it was unclear for a long time what kind of tumor it was. A biopsy (a piece of tissue) was taken. And then more biopsies. They suspected lymphoma, but it was not clear what type it was. Then no treatment is possible. Scans followed each other and on one of those scans they found a completely different tumor: breast cancer. I was able to start a treatment program immediately. It was a tough time.”

After three years, a specialized doctor from Germany finally came up with the definitive diagnosis for the tumor behind the breastbone. “It was a rare type of Hodgkin. The chance of recovery was high. “So within all my bad luck I was lucky. I couldn’t have hoped for more. and it took me a while to really believe it. I got chemotherapy pretty quickly and started feeling better. That was three years ago now.”

Record the new situation
Although she still had some energy, it became less and less during her illness. She wanted to capture the emotions in the waiting room and looked for a different form of creative imagination. “I always want to capture a new situation. That is my profession.” The project grew slowly. From the start she took pictures of the waiting rooms with her phone. She found the interiors interesting. She did not photograph the people she saw there, but she did make notes of conversations that took place in her head. “There is hardly any talking in oncology waiting rooms, that stimulated my imagination and so I started coming up with waiting room dialogues. Hope, despair, bad luck, happiness, life and death are recurring themes in the project. The concept of time also became important. How much time do I have left?”

A book that fits the process
Together with graphic designer Esther de Vries, she came up with a suitable format to shape the project in images and text in a book. Photos from the waiting room chairs are combined with collages. Just like in the text, the viewer sometimes does not know whether what you are looking at is reality. “I also often found my situation unreal during my illness.” Blue on the cover refers to the abundance of blue in the hospital, from surgical gowns to rubber gloves. The text was divided into scenes, because the main target group – patients – sometimes find it difficult to concentrate on long stretches of text. Randomly throughout the book she left pages blank. “That might irritate the reader. And that is good. The randomly recurring numbered empty pages reflect the emptiness and the waiting in the hospital.” The cover of the book is also based on that emptiness of waiting. A white chair in the middle of a blue environment. No title on the cover. You are sucked into the chair.

Throughout the book, conversations between the main character and her children set the tone of the story. These conversations bring some light, love and humor. Furthermore, a crow flying freely and a transparent fish swimming around in an aquarium in the waiting room play a symbolic role.

Tour of the works
We take a tour of the works. The exhibition was designed by her daughter Sam Wissink, a second-year theater design student at the HKU. She could do it as a study assignment for school. The exhibition starts with a stopped clock that reads five to twelve. The book is placed on a mirror, as a sign that this fate can affect anyone. There are a number of hospital sheets hanging throughout the rooms, on which texts from the book are printed. In various collages I see silhouettes, including one with blood test tubes and red footsteps. The transparent fish plays a major role in the exhibition, it swims in an aquarium, in a room that is designed as a waiting room, with one red chair and a plastic plant. “I made that fish up, I never came across it in the waiting room. The fish is transparent, it is a glass catfish. In the hospital I was x-rayed, I felt transparent. I made collages from the fish’s perspective.”

Atypical
The photos that Maaike Koning took for this project are atypical. She usually portrays people in her environment, focusing on the relationship between those people and the environment. In this context, she also makes double portraits, which express the bond between a person and his or her family member, friend or colleague. She often worked on commission, always on location. “I have always been interested in the behavior of people towards each other and their environment. The waiting rooms were a new working area to observe this. Why don’t people say anything there? What is their body language like? Where will they sit? How is the room furnished? Do I feel stress or relief in the space? I could get started with this in my collages and texts. It kept me busy.”

Does Maaike have a key work?
She has. “It is a portrait of my grandfather and grandmother, one of my first double portraits. I made it when I was about 22. I was excited about it. My grandfather has shaving cream on his face in that photo. My grandmother liked the smell of it and she was always happy when my grandfather was neatly shaved. That information from their relationship has been incorporated into the portrait. I also like the light, the Northern Lights. I have always continued to use that. It is cool and soft light. I also like dim light.”
She followed the photography course at the Hague Royal Academy of Visual Arts, which was still at the Tarwekamp at the time. She now calls herself a visual creator rather than just a photographer. “Something has come up. Making collages arose because photography was difficult at the time, but also because I thought photography was too limited a means to capture the emotions in the waiting room. So I discovered another way to express my imagination. The book emerged from a bad time, but it can be read with a smile and a tear.”

Finally, what is her philosophy?
“I think it is important that the viewer has freedom for their own interpretation. Of course you steer in a certain direction, but there is freedom to shape it personally. I also think it is important that something comes from the heart of the creator. I think you feel that as a viewer. Personal interest is a good basis for a work that you can look at for a long time.”
The book can be ordered via Maaike’s website at bol.com.
Photo 6 and 8: the book, photo 9: grandfather and grandmother, photo 10: Maaike Koning

 

https://www.maaikekoning.nl/
https://www.maaikekoning.nl/store
https://www.instagram.com/maaikekoning.nl/
https://gallerywm.com/WP/maaike-koning-wacht-af-1904-18052024/
https://inzaken.eu/2024/05/14/hoe-maaike-koning-haar-langdurige-periode-van-ziekzijn-creatief-verwerkte/