cross-cut wood ‒ length-cut wood

In the sixties Maria van Elk was trained at the department of Free Painting of the Minerva Academy in Groningen (Netherlands).
From the beginning of the seventies she has focussed on fundamental drawing and painting. Van Elks drawings and paintings from this period do not refer to anything outside her work, but are a direct sublimation of the act which is guided specifically by the properties of the material.
At the solo exhibition Maria van Elk, tekenen 1973-1980 (Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam), drawings were shown in which the hardness of pencil, charcoal and chalk or the folding or wrinkling of paper played a crucial role.
In many cases the final result is not predictable since the drawing process is controlled only to a certain extent. Mostly, only a few minimal lines fill the drawing-space.
During the period 1980-1986 she focussed more on mixing colours and non-colours, in the series “crossings”. Crossing the planes drawn with oilpastel, it becomes clear how one colour visualy dominates the other. Cross-cut wood and Length-cut wood was executed in 1986. These woodprints originate in the different images of along and engrain sawed wood. Here also the physical properties are  put central, in this case the crude image of the tree rings  who contain the history of the tree.
Like carpenter tools, rubbers, rulers etc. suspend on nails on the wall, the four parts of endgrain wood are hanged behind each other on a common balance point
In comparison to Van Elks rigorous earlier work Cross-cut Wood has a more relaxed, almost frivolous narure.
Van Elk teaches, besides her work as a visual artis, at the Academy of Art and Industry in Enschede (Netherlands).

Leontine Coelewij in Catalogus Rijksaankopen 1987. Werk van hedendaagse beeldende kunstenaars | Rijksdienst Beeldende Kunst, Den Haag NL | 1988 | page 71

In her talk during the opening of the exhibition the exposorium staff member Hedriekje Bosma stressed the role of the printer during the creative process. According to her he has to keep an eye on how the artist works in order to be able to anticipate on it. The printer has to translate the ideas of the artist into graphics, for instance by indicating what format and what sort of paper would be most suitable. A good printer always is one step ahead of the artist.
Does Rento Brattinga agree with this description? “Well, to be ahead of the artist I find a bit stiff. But I do believe that a good printer at least has to go ahead together with the artist, so that can anticipate the specific problems that arise”. One example of this collaboration is the coming about of Maria van Elk's Circles Inside Out printed on Japanese rice paper.
“At first she wanted to break a stone and print the line of fracture. I found this not a successful idea. Her following suggestion was to fold the paper, to print the design and then unfold the paper again. It seemed to me that a thick stone could handle the difference in tension. This way the work originated in dialogue”.

Quote from the above article by Dick Roodenburg | Ad Valvas | 3 December 3, 1992 | page 8

That brightness is not equal to predictability proves the object Cross-cut wood and Length-cut wood from 1986. The different parts of this 2 part work are hung on top of each other in such a way that the underlying coloured structures are partly visible. On the robust round forms and the elongated forms next to it the imprints of wooden disks and wooden planks are visible, and with this simple fact the two essentials of the pattern of wood is registered in a lovely way.

For Rento, the printed collection | Cover & page 78-79
Edition Steendrukkerij Amsterdam & Fries Museum Leeuwarden (no date)

The concise presentation of the material and nothing other than the material in the prints of slices and planks of wood in the wood prints by Maria van Elk.

Carel Blotkamp in Art for Sure | Translation Femme Vertaal
Edition Aegon N.V., Den Haag NL 2010 (page 279)

Art for sure - Cover