Dunja Nadjézjda Hak

Escher was first and foremost a printmaker. That said, he also produced a variety of designs for art in public spaces. For example, he designed some magnificent tiled pillars with regular tessellations for two schools. The pillars were recently restored and relocated, and now for the first time the original tiles can be seen in Escher in The Palace!

In an article in the Volkskrant, dating 23 February, Escher is subject to some very unfortunate framing. This gives rise to the impression of Escher having been a collaborationist, and that is unwarranted. Escher was not a Nazi sympathizer. Our curator Dunja Nadjézjda Hak explains.

The Escher, close up exhibition is closed. The past few months 50,500 visitors have enjoyed this new perspective on Eschers life and work. Over the past few days we have been working into the night to dismantle the exhibition and restore normal order. Back to the permanent set-up, back to everyday business as usual. Luckily the everyday can also be possessed of extraordinary beauty.

Escher’s work is known for such things as his optical illusions and his playing with perspective. He had an aptitude for rendering day-to-day subjects unfamiliar by means of the viewpoint he took or the cutout he made. The ideal nourishment for this was photography, which Escher took up when he was 15 years old.

During the 1920s and 1930s, Maurits Cornelis Escher often went on long trips through Italy to soak up some inspiration for his work. Escher’s preliminary studies comprised not only sketches but also photos.

On 3 February our new exhibition opened: Escher, close up. Escher was a keen photographer and for the first time his photo archive is on show. It gives us a new perspective on the artist and his work. How did this exhibition come about?

In my previous story, I wrote about Escher’s cabinet of curiosities. A picture of this cabinet still exists, dating from 1915. What can this picture tell us about Escher? First and foremost: Escher was not a boy with a shabby room and a couple of dull posters of beautiful girls above his bed. This was a serious young man with serious interests who was given space to extend these and show them off.

During the 17th century it became fashionable among the elite to create ‘cabinets of curiosities’. Escher had such a room too, albeit a small 20th-century one. It doesn’t exist anymore, but fortunately we still have the photos.

The work of all great masters is revered, copied and parodied, but no other artist has had his or her work feature so prolifically in tattoos as Escher. The Dutch grandmaster of graphic art is also the king of body art.