the big adventure - little church of persingen - 1989

All paintings on bitumen paper Bart Drost has made until 1987 are represented in the church of Persingen. Of each work three fragments have been chosen; these five hundred sections are applied to hand-moulded and -painted tiles. Together with two thousand sunflower yellow glazed tiles they make up a floor that has been perfectly constructed in loose sand. After the exhibition period of three weeks the floor was removed and the tiles were then used in various houses in The Netherlands, England and Germany.

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the tiles

Bart Drost received a project subsidy from the province of Gelderland for his project Het Grote Avontuur. After all, manufacturing more than 2,500 ceramic floor tiles by hand is no small feat. Fortunately, there were government-subsidized 'social workshops' at the time, where people with a mild mental or physical disability or people who otherwise could not find work in the regular labor process were welcome. A ceramic company in Amersfoort -specialized in the casting of vases- saw in the manual manufacture of the tiles a nice variety for the employees. So 2500 tiles were made and fired. When it came to applying the drawings, Drost had the requirement that he would personally come and apply the 235 drawings. However, the director suggested leaving three design drawings and a Spanish worker would then paint the tiles.

After a few weeks the time had come: the tiles had been formed and had gone through the first firing and the Spaniard had applied the drawings with glaze. Drost was stunned to see the result: the Spaniard had copied his design drawings freehand onto the tiles, as if they were Drost's own handwriting. The conclusion was that the Spaniard applied all the images and that Drost, together with the other employees, applied the sunflower yellow glaze to the remaining tiles.

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the little spring flowers


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Bart Drost

free artist

Graafseweg 183a
6531ZR Nijmegen
The Netherlands