76 - Carel Willink (1900-1983)

Carel Willink (1900-1983) Rijksmuseum by night,signed and dated 'Willink '50' (lower right),oil on canvas, 66,5x52,5 cm,Exhibited:-Amsterdam, Kunsthandel Huinck & Scherjon, ‘Nieuw werk en enige abstracte composities uit 1922-24 van A.C. Willink', 23 October-18 November 1950, no. 8.-Amersfoort, De Zonnehof, ‘Willink 75 jaar: schilderijen, voorstudies, aquarellen, tekeningen van Carel Willink', 19 December 1974-2 March 1975, no. 10-157.Literature:-N. Miret, ‘Kunst en Kunstleven', 1950, no. 12.-Huinck & Scherjon, ‘Nieuw werk en enige abstracte composities uit 1922-24 van A.C. Willink', Amsterdam 1950, no. 8.-Walter Kramer and Marja Roscam Abbing, ‘Willink', The Hague 1973, ill. p. 139, no. 157.-De Zonnehof, ‘Willink 75 jaar: schilderijen, voorstudies, aquarellen, tekeningen van Carel Willink', Amersfoort 1974, no. 10-157.-H.L.C. Jaffé, ‘Willink', Vol. 3, Amsterdam 1986, ill. p. 227, no. 224.-Rémon van Gemeren, ‘Amsterdam door de ogen van Carel Willink’, Zwolle 2021, ill. p. 70.Provenance:-Private collection, the Netherlands.-Collection Loek Brons, Amsterdam.-Collection Dr I. Swelheim, Amsterdam.-With Kunsthandel Studio 2000, Blaricum, where acquired by the present owner.In 1935, Carel Willink (1900-1983) moved into his house and studio on the Ruysdaelkade in Amsterdam, making the stately architecture and gardens of the Rijksmuseum a familiar sight and potential source of inspiration. Willink viewed the world as secretive, inscrutable and transient. The enduring beauty of the architecture may have offered a sense of stability in a world he perceived as uncertain. His pessimistic outlook also found expression in his self-criticism: ‘I don’t enjoy drawing. As a young man I certainly couldn’t draw very well at all and now I’m a good bit older I still can’t’.Willink is considered one of the most prominent representatives of magical realism in the Netherlands. The movement emerged at a time when abstraction and Expressionism were gaining prominence. Willink must have first encountered related artistic developments when he moved to Berlin in 1920, where he encountered the work of German artists such as George Grosz (1893-1959) and Otto Dix (1891-1969), associated with Neue Sachlichkeit. This movement favoured figurative representation and a critical, often unsentimental view of modern society. After returning to the Netherlands in 1923, Willink gradually developed his own style through experiments with abstraction, Cubism and Neoclassicism. From the 1930s onwards, he increasingly turned towards a precise, realistic manner of painting, combining carefully rendered details with mysterious and unsettling atmospheres. Willink himself disliked the label ‘magical realism’, arguing that there was nothing magical about his work. He preferred the term ‘imaginary realism’, describing how he rearranged elements of reality through his imagination to create scenes that were recognisable yet unfamiliar.In 1931, Willink travelled through Italy with his brother Jan, visiting cities including Florence and Pisa. During this journey, he developed an admiration for the work of Giorgio de Chirico (1888-1978), whose metaphysical paintings feature classical architecture, deserted spaces, elongated shadows and unusual lighting. De Chirico’s work became an important influence on Willink’s artistic development. Willink subsequently developed a distinctive visual language in which recognisable buildings and objects are placed in carefully constructed, often deserted settings. Rather than adopting the experimental approaches of movements such as Abstract Expressionism and CoBrA, he remained committed to traditional painting techniques and meticulous realism. In Rijksmuseum by nightpainted in 1950, the classical architecture, dark sky and dramatic interplay of light and shadow recall aspects of De Chirico’s metaphysical imagery.Willink creates a sense of impending unease in this painting through the contrast between the dark, ominous sky and the various sources of light. Moonlight and artificial illumination appear to fall on the Rijksmuseum and its surroundings, creating a striking interplay of light and shadow. Although the architectural details are rendered realistically, their unusual illumination lends the scene an atmosphere that seems removed from everyday experience. The absence of people reinforces the sense of isolation. A tree trunk appears to have pushed through the pavement, lifting one of the paving stones and introducing an unexpected disturbance into the otherwise orderly setting. The monumental gate in the foreground also seems somewhat out of place. This is the Herepoort, a structure assembled from fragments of a former city gate of Groningen, originally erected in 1621. The fragments were incorporated into the gardens of the Rijksmuseum in the nineteenth century, with the reconstructed gate in place by the museum’s opening in 1885. Its presence introduces a historical architectur