“This series of illustrations arose in a period that was defined by silence, isolation, being homebound, and seeing very few friends and family. The absence of, and the longing for humans in my life manifested itself in drawing an impression of the human figures that couldn’t be there. What emerged was an ever-growing group of people with whom I surrounded myself.”

Vere wanted to bring the people she had drawn to life and translate their existence into the space around her. Drawing the human figures on soft material made it possible to wrap them around the body. This way, the sense of longing became even more tangible. Impulsively and intuitively, Vere has captured her observations and fascination for details in her figures. A crooked nose, a glimpse, a certain posture, a movement; small details of the people around her that are more often forgotten than remembered. She hopes viewers allow themselves the freedom to use her work to create stories of their own.

In addition to the drawings, Vere wrote a small book. It is a personal piece of text in which the main character tries to relate to another.

Vere van der Veen (1995, NL) graduated from the department of Image and Language at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam in 2020. The illustrations shown here are part of her graduation project. Vere writes, builds, draws and makes. In her work she tries to capture the small fragments of life we do not easily see and often do not recollect.

www.verevanderveen.nl