Klaas van Weringh

Home: Ottawa, Ontario
Title: Anna, Close Up
Media: Pencil / crayon
Dimensions: 40 x 50 cm

Visual art and theatre are both important to me. In my paintings, I’ve always insisted on capturing the likenesses of my models, though I didn’t really know why that should be important, because the paintings weren’t necessarily about the models. I always felt the models were actors in a play. But every play director knows that the most significant thing an actor brings to the stage is him or herself. On stage and in painting, drama arises from the potential of the unexplained, the unsaid, and the unknown. You can lose these if you reject the truth and reality of the model. This is especially true, obviously, for a portrait. What father can understand his daughter? In this portrait, I simply gave in to her mystery.

Klaas van Weringh was unable to continue being an active professional artist from 1987 to 2002 because of his responsibility to his growing family.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS:

1984 Kaspar Gallery, Yorkville, Toronto
1980 Kingston Public Library

GROUP EXHIBITIONS:

2003 Kingston Arts Council Jury Exhibition, Kingston Public Library
1986-1987 “Kingston Regional Invitational Exhibition”, Agnes Etherington Art Centre
1983 to 1987 “Collectors’ Choice”, five annual group shows, Kaspar Gallery, Toronto
1982 “OSA Image ’81”, Ontario Society of Artists annual juried exhibition
1981 “Regional Juried Exhibition”, Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Kingston
1981 “Rodman Hall Jury Exhibition”, St. Catharine’s
1981 “Kingston on View in Toronto”, invitational, Queen’s Park, Toronto
1979 “Rodman Hall Jury Exhibition”, St. Catharine’s
1978 “Kingston Drawing”, St. Lawrence College Gallery, invitational, Kingston
1976 “The Art of Kingston”, St. Lawrence College Gallery, juried, Kingston
1974 “Agnes Etherington Art Centre Spring Show”, juried, Kingston
1975-1982 Various group shows, F.D. Fine Arts Gallery, Kingston, Brock Street Gallery, Kingston, and Gallery Idée, Toronto

AWARDS:

2003 Honourable Mention (established artist category), Kingston Arts Council Exhibition
1984 Ontario Arts Council Materials Grant
1980 Ontario Arts Council Materials Grant
1979 Ontario Arts Council Grant to Individual Artist

PUBLISHED REPRODUCTIONS:

Cover drawings and paintings for four issues of The Whig-Standard Magazine (1980’s)
Announcement of solo exhibition, Kaspar Gallery, in Canadian Art, Fall 1984 issue
Portrait of Tom Marshall, on front cover of his poetry book The Elements (Oberon, 1980)
Illustrated David Kemp’s A Child Growing Up (Simon & Pierre,1979)
Cover drawing for four issues of Quarry, poetry quarterly, Queen’s Press, 1976

EXCERPTS FROM REVIEWS:

“Klaas van Weringh’s strongly realistic drawings and oil paintings…are haunting and sometimes disturbing.” (Whig Standard, Nov. 15, 1980)
“Images of lasting importance…betray the artist’s philosophy, express an emotion, or simply strike a sympathetic chord….a more-than-photographic quality.” (The Whig Standard, Nov. 29, 1980)
[The Rodman Hall Jury Exhibition includes a] “beauty by Kingston artist Klaas R. van Weringh that is incredible in its realism.”- St. Catharine’s Standard, April 7, 1979
“Perhaps the most dazzling piece in the show is Klaas van Weringh’s…which shows a mastery of drawing technique in tandem with simple design and profound detail….stunning in its clarity and lifelike quality – The Whig Standard, Sept. 23, 1978