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The Contribution A number of meetings of my wife An and myself with
Maria follow, starting from July 2012 with a visit to the
Van Abbe Museum to view the work Increasing ↔ Decre-
An and Martien de Voigt asing and to discuss its conservation by the museum staff.
Main sponsors By the end of the same year we meet her in the ‘Stedelijk
Museum Schiedam’, where her work Lose One’s Balance
In March 2013 I started an email correspondence with (1986), donated to the museum by her, is exhibited.
Maria van Elk as a result of our donation of the work of art She then writes to me as follows:
Increasing ↔ Decreasing (1976) to the Van Abbe Museum ‘What about writing a booklet together about the ‘physical
in Eindhoven. In this work of art Maria explicitly works basis’ in a number of my works, such as Increasing Decreasing,
with material, form and line. During our first encounter Two straight lines one of which is always bent, Topological
with her work in farmer Waalkens’ ‘stable gallery’ in Symmetry, Lose One’s Balance. I fear that this aspect of my
Finsterwolde in 1977 we instantly bought this monu- work is otherwise lost completely, as art professionals are not
mental work (1.5 x 7.5 mtrs), consisting of one continuous inquisitive.’
white line spread over 5 large canvases blackened with oil I reply that topology is more in the domain of mathematics
pastel. Afterwards it was exhibited, among other places, than physics. Then Maria starts to further organize her
in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam (1981) and in the archives.
‘Kunstamt Kreuzberg’ in Berlin (1983) to finally find a She then writes to me as follows:
permanent location in the Nuclear Physics Laboratory of ‘I shall try to write it down. In the first place I have made
the University of Groningen. a development from work after an example (figurative) to
After Ad Dekkers and Jan Schoonhoven this formed a concrete work, the material itself and all the exciting things
fantastic continuation of our quest for essence and research hidden in it. This runs parallel with my own development as
into the essence of matter, form, colour and the ulti- a human being, from imitation (after an example) to inde-
mate character of the line. Apparently, she is focused on pendence. Independence gives freedom to discover.’
concrete, clear images speaking entirely for themselves.
After this introduction to her, for us, fascinating work I answer as follows:
we have kept following her. Especially in her collection ‘At home my wife An and I have immediately gone through
at home in Amsterdam we found a lot of inspiring works my summaries of our conversations and you will find the result
that we wanted to have around us. In this way we were below. Just like in your case, Maria, this cannot wait and I
able to obtain a number of interesting works, including am curious to find out what I can expect of you as to your
some presented to us by the artist, which fitted in with our development. I have tried to extract the essentials and to write
human pursuit of essence. it down as concise as possible. I think it important that each
All this has left its traces in part of my inaugural speech as keyword gets a deep meaning and each sentence has one or
professor in Nuclear Physics Techniques at the Technical more keywords. That is what I demand from myself, because it
University Eindhoven in 1989, as follows: is about your essence!!!!’
‘Profound research into the essence of the line, especially in This is the summary:
drawing, has been carried out by the artist Maria van Elk. Maria van Elk explores the domain in which images are
She mirrors a line with a thread fixed at one point. The incorporated in the material as details and are as such
symmetry is determined by the proportionality of size and of minor importance. However, as soon as the details
position. Line and thread are each made up of uninterrupted shift and become subject a new visual independence
matter, because of which they are topologically equivalent. emerges. One sees what one has not seen before. Her
However, gravity works differently on line and thread, so work is concrete with occasionally magnified contrasts.
that the symmetry is seemingly broken, but the topological The asymmetric symmetry is accentuated in her topolo-
symmetry is not. She also devises solutions, with white oil gical works. Or as in Two straight lines one of which is
pastel on black canvas among other things, in which it appears always bent. A straight line on a bent surface becomes
to be possible that of two straight lines one is always bent.’ bent and straight.

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