CLAUDI KESSELS

Cluster Exhibitor| Cluster Illustration | Alternative Fair 2021

Kessels works and lives in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. After studying English language and literature and teaching for five years at a secondary school in Amsterdam, she decided to follow her dreams and applied for the popular art school the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. Claudi Kessels won the Items & Industry Prize with her exam work. Since then she worked for many magazines and companies and participated in several exhibitions (Water World • Amsterdam, Stranger • Madrid, now: NYCSALT VS)

A wild daffodil is the beard of the sailor who would rather work in his garden than travel on the ocean for days and nights with a rough crew. A crumpled map is the dress for the girl who takes a jump and decides to be less of a control freak.

Claudi Kessels’ work often combines photographical elements with drawings. These photographical elements are chosen with great care: they tell part of the story, refer to a time, place, moment in history, give a twist and add to the power of the illustration.

Claudi Kessels is mother of three wonderful kids, loves the city Amsterdam, reading, indigo, the Dutch coast, swimming and soup.

ARTIST STATEMENT:
You often see me walking through the streets with my head bowed. I search for inspiration. I look near, in the kitchen drawer, a backpack or the sidewalk. I pick up a leaf, a candy paper or feather from the ground. I look for the right element to tell my story. to draw.

The use of ordinary, anonymous objects in my illustrations establishes a connection. There is a recognition, ah-ha moment. By giving the object a different context there is alienation but hopefully an entry point for your own memory, experience or story. My illustrations take a close look at everyday life and give it a different colour, texture, language.

My work is often commissioned and for abstract complex texts my choice of object provides a good anchor point. For me and the viewer. A new story is told around something familiar.

I mix analog with digital. Ink is my favourite material. I love the noise, the unpredictability, the colours; and that I can also draw very finely. Lines, dots and textures. Carefully I build an illustration, but it also needs a momentum. Ink forces me to keep the momentum going.