An Unexpected ART Adventure: Museum Jan Cunen Blijft Slapen

Today, I found myself quite unexpectedly in the world of Museum Jan Cunen Blijft Slapen. On a drizzly afternoon, I accepted an invitation to view an artwork, which spontaneously turned into visiting several addresses where art and hospitality meet.Behind every front door waited a new story, a new perspective on art and on people.

Robert Walker, Toronto, 1977

There was only time left for a few houses. At one of them, I happened to be the one hundred and first visitor a small, funny coincidence that instantly made me smile.

In another house, a woman recognised me: “You’re Rianne in opposite of Grote Kerk, aren’t you?” The lady was surrounded by a lot of women sitting around a big table in the living room. And yes, I confirmed, I was indeed Rianne in opposite of Grote Kerk. It was both funny and heart-warming how, in such brief encounters, art, people, and places can overlap and touch.

At my final stop, just a few minutes before six, I was the last visitor of the day. The resident asked me, “What do you see in the photograph?”

I looked closely.“I see a shiny, aluminium-like form,” I said. “With reflections of blue and white, almost like Delftware. It feels like the mirrored surface of a vase or something similar.”

She looked at me and smiled.“You’re the last visitor,” she said, “and the first to see what she is looking at.”

It felt like a special compliment, as if, for a moment, there was a quiet connection between the artist, the resident, and myself. Three observers, all searching for meaning within an image.

Scheltens & Abbenes, Baluster #4, 2010

What stays with me most is the pride of the residents — how their eyes lit up as they spoke about the artwork displayed in their homes. The conversations were short but filled with enthusiasm. For a moment, you share each other’s gaze — the experience of art, the wonder, the delight.

Among the works I saw was an oil painting of broad, bold colour fields by Jan Toorop created in 1887, The Pianist, and a striking photograph shot in 1977,Toronto, by Robert Walker. Two completely different worlds, yet both rich in composition, dark colours, and light. The longer you looked, the more you discovered.

Jan Toorop, Het pianospel, 1887

Despite the grey weather, it was a warm and extraordinary afternoon, full of reflections, both literal and figurative.

Museum Jan Cunen Blijft Slapen is a unique art tour through a neighbourhood in Oss, where for one afternoon only, artworks from the museum are exhibited inside private homes.

With the help of a simple route map, you wander from house to house, never knowing what awaits behind each door. Every doorstep holds a surprise, every encounter a new perspective on how art lives among us.

Just like these artworks found meaning through their surroundings and their hosts, my own handcrafted designs come alive through their environment and the person who wears them.Design, place, and presence, all woven together in one story.

Imagine wearing a one-of-a-kind-design made just for you, how would that feel?

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In the Layers of Han Klinkhamer

An Unexpected Entrance

Last Sunday, I stepped with wet fresh washed hair into the Museum Jan Cunen just before closing time. Not planned, but out of necessity: after a debate with my teenagers about who should hang up the laundry, and with the heat outside pressing down, I longed for fresh air and quiet. What began as an escape soon turned into an encounter that moved me deeply, the exhibition of Han Klinkhamer.

Layer by Layer, Nature

His paintings and works are an abstract translation of the landscape around us. What strikes me most is that he gives his works no titles. This leaves them open, you don’t have to ‘understand’ anything, you’re invited only to experience. Black and white dominate, my favourite combination. And the larger the work, the more I lose myself within it. This is art you don’t just look at, you feel it: thick strokes of oil paint, layered millimetres deep, almost sculpted; cuts into paper that reveal new layers; flashes of hidden colour suddenly emerging into view.

A Work That Lingers

One white panel caught me most of all. There was a dynamism in it that felt both still and alive. I found myself standing, watching, as if something beneath the surface kept shifting, quietly, insistently. Another work surprised me: an ink drawing into which Klinkhamer had cut sharp incisions, exposing new layers. I could picture it as a wallpaper that would cover my livingroom.

Dreaming of Walls

As I wandered through the exhibition, I thought: how extraordinary would it be if an artist like Klinkhamer could work directly on a wall? A permanent, three-dimensional artwork, part of the very structure of a home. Or wallpaper inspired by his work, so that the layers, cuts, and textures would literally surround you. Art not hanging on the wall, but becoming the wall.

A Second Visit

Because my first visit lasted barely fifteen minutes, I returned Wednesday. This time, I had more space, more time. I savoured the silence, even though there were other visitors in every room. What struck me was how warm and welcoming the staff at the Jan Cunen Museum are: eager to connect, generous in sharing stories, creating an atmosphere that feels both intimate and inviting.

Nature From the Inside Out

What touches me most in Klinkhamer’s work is his qoute about how it makes you

feel nature from the inside out. He expresses something that doesn’t literally exist, and yet you recognise it immediately. It’s as though you are seeing the essence of a landscape without needing a tree, or a horizon, or a sky. His art shows that abstraction is not distant or cold, but can in fact be one of the most immediate ways to experience something vast and intimate at once.

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Magdalena Abakanowicz: A Feminine Force in a Brutalist World

Only after my twelfth birthday did I have a bedroom with a window.

Each night I would duck beneath a heavy oak beam to reach my bed. And there it was, the window, opening onto a wide view of the green landscapes surrounding Den Bosch and, in sharp contrast, the concrete tower of the provincial government building: a brutalist creation by architect Hugo Maaskant.

Yesterday, I cycled there with my parents to see a monumental artwork that has hung in that building for fifty years: Bois le Duc by Magdalena Abakanowicz, The Duke’s Forest. On the way, my father recalled how vividly he remembered the endless lorries delivering concrete to construct the province house. For the first time, we were going to enter this building.

Inside, the vast and rather austere council chamber is softened by Abakanowicz’s woven giant, 7 by 22 metres of natural fibres: wool, horsehair, sisal. Nineteen panels suspended in space. The contrast with the cold geometry of the surroundings is striking. Inspired by nature, it overwhelms the visitor with enlarged details of a primeval forest rendered in textile. Earthy tones, layered textures, irregular surfaces, every detail bearing the spirit of the 1970s.

What moves me most is how Abakanowicz brought a feminine softness into such a masculine, concrete space. A sense of protection, of closeness, of nature’s rhythm, quietly holding its own against steel and glass. Commissioned for this place more than fifty years ago, and still standing strong, it proves how design, when created with intention, can outlast both time and trends.

This artwork is only on display this summer, as part of a joint exhibition with the TextielMuseum and the Noordbrabants Museum.

I create personal designs for clients. I listen, translate, and shape their wishes into garments that hold meaning, pieces that carry both strength and softness, both structure and soul. Like Bois le Duc, they are created for a moment, but designed to endure.

If you are looking for something special made just for you, a garment that reflects who you are and what you want to embody, I would love to create it with you.

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