Collection: Anneke de Vries

De Vries trained in classical drawing at an academy in Rotterdam, spending years mastering controlled line and form before deciding, in her thirties, to unlearn much of that discipline on purpose. Her current paintings are fast, physical, and unplanned — built from sweeping loaded brushwork, dripped and flicked paint, and loose scribbled linework that cuts across the canvas almost like handwriting. She often works with the canvas flat on the floor or propped at an angle so gravity plays a role in the final piece, letting drips and pooling paint become part of the composition rather than something to control. Movement matters more to her than accuracy — she'll return to a canvas across several sessions, adding fresh gestural passes over dried layers until the piece feels like it's caught mid-motion rather than settled. She describes the shift from her early training as a kind of relief. "I spent years learning to make a perfect line," she says. "Now I'm more interested in what happens the moment control slips a little."