at Museum Singer Laren
Last year in May I was contacted by Suzanne Veldink who was making an overview exhibition on the Indo-European painter Jan Toorop (1858-1929). She came across a blog I wrote in 2018 on the work I saw of Toorop in which he poses as a young man between batiks wearing batik;
“Where Raden Saleh represent the Javanese artist getting praise outside Indonesia and more specifically in the Netherlands for showing us true Javanese culture. Jan Toorop is the Javanese born-artist getting praise for being Dutch… He left an interesting body of work in which his roots clearly shine through, however he is always seen as an Dutch symbolic artist with a interest in Indonesia.“
For the exhibition The worlds of Jan Toorop at Museum SingerLaren from 21 January till 10 May 2026, Suzanne wanted to highlight all sides of Toorop, starting with his biggest inspiration, where he was born. His love for Indonesia is shown in many ways through out his work and there is a surprising number of works in which he depicts batik. Not any kind of batik, but typical for that time and the place he lived as a child.
I was asked to do the audiotour for my favourite work, the self-portrait with batiks, and an actual matching batik from the Wereldmuseum Rotterdam collection. I was also included in the short film Mals Media made in which I share more about the style of Batiks Toorop depicted and a little on Batik in general. The video was shown in full at Museum Singer Laren and can be watched here online.
For the opening on 21 January, in between my travel to London & Singapore, I designed buttons that were used during the opening. I made 4 designs for them to pick one, but all 4 got used, what a compliment!
The inspiration came of course from the batiks Toorop depicts, with the tumpals clearly visible. I added swans, on request, to refer to Singer Laren. When I saw the swans in Toorop work, when I finally got to visit the exhibition, it made me smile.
My contribution didn’t end here, I also gave three workshops, two Batikworkshops for grown-ups on 17 & 18 April and one Paper Sarong workshop for kids on 19 April. With the great assistance of museum educators Dineke and Jessica we dove into a long weekend filled with Batik.
The participants took inspiration from the batiks painter Jan Toorop depicted in his works for their own Batik. I prepared for the workshop examples & a pallet of colours to match with the batiks in Toorop’s work. It was great to guide two groups through the ~ difficult ~ process of making a batik using the canting. We were in the greenhouse in the garden, a lovely location & so many other visitors enjoyed taking a look at what was being created.
