Nul
Diana Stigter and Pietje Tegenbosch in conversation with Jan Schoonhoven
Inspiration in White
I never wanted to be an artist. I can still remember the teacher, when I was in the sixth year at primary school, saying: ‘So you’re going to be a painter, right, Jantje?’ But I said, ‘No way, sir!’ I’ve never wanted to go through life as an artist. The idea that I should pursue a career as a painter has always been odd to me.
My job with the Dutch PTT meant I could work on my art at my own pace. The others weren’t financially dependent on their art either. We all had regular jobs. Armando worked for the Haagse Post newspaper, Peeters at the Gemeentemuseum in The Hague and Henderikse did all sorts of things. We were proper gentlemen, actually. To me that job meant order. You had to be on time. I would leave the house be- fore 7 a.m. so as not to have to rush to work. Everything took place according to a set rhythm; I’ve always felt a need for structure. The fact that we presented ourselves as a group came out of the Informal period, when we were already writing manifestos and all that sort of thing.
Armando liked to write. And he was good at it. Some of his slogans – like the one about art that isn’t art anymore – were almost a gospel for us. We wanted to provoke. The German Zero artists were also noted for that. In that respect the way had been prepared for us. We called our art Nul to distinguish it from Zero. Nul was just Dutch. And anyway 0 is a wonderful form: round, always good, and doesn’t mean anything more. Still, I usually talk about ZERO art myself – I almost never say Nul.
Initially there were five of us. When Kees van Bohemen left there were four, and when Jan Henderikse became a New Realist there were only three of us left. Three Germans and three Dutchmen for our ZERO exhibition at the Gemeentemuseum in The Hague. Armando’s contribution was his Zwart water (Black Water). It looked great, really enigmatic. A dark room, with a few lights here and there and a plat- form above the water. It was like you were walking alongside some- thing unfathomably deep. Only once the public had thrown too many coins in could you see the water wasn’t all that deep.
Peeters was always the linchpin of our group. He’d previously founded the Informals, of course. In hindsight you realize that it’s one continuous line of evolution. Nul’s place in history is secure now, and the Informal period too, but that took longer. Only after ZERO had become quite well-known did we realize that the Informal period had been the first stage, the true beginning. I hadn’t thought so previously, not at all. It looked so different, after all.
I met Henk Peeters shortly after the war. We would run into each other every once in a while. We’d go to the Pulchri parties together.1 They were usually quite fun. We always looked each other up, even after Henk moved to Arnhem. Jan Henderikse was a regular fixture in this house. We always got along pretty well, and as far as the make-up of the group: well, my goodness, Henk wanted to bring in Bouthoorn, for example, but he wasn’t an abstract painter. And Jan felt we should ask Armando to join. He was right about that, of course.
We were absolutely not an idealistic movement. The Germans were, but not us. Not even Peeters. We wanted to accept society as it was. So we got sponsors very early on. For our first Nul exhibition, Armando managed to get a car tyre manufacturer. And I used Histor paint to make my cut corrugated cardboard work. Henk used tins from a specific brand. We were all conscious of the fact that we were living in this society and that we had to accept that. Not that we did- n’t all have some form of social engagement, but the Germans were much more strident about it! Mack, Piene and Uecker were true idealists. I even said to Henk and Armando later: ‘Jesus, did you believe all that so literally?’ You can’t change anything with art. It’s about the moment; it’s about beautiful things. A good Rembrandt is still worth looking at, right?
It was really easy to make contact with the foreigners. I first met Manzoni at Hans Sonnenberg’s in Rotterdam. He was an aristocrat, and very wealthy to boot, which is not always the case for a count. Klein and Manzoni were a lot more philosophical than the Dutch. You would notice that most in Klein’s texts. He always had wonderful ideas. Think of that time he wanted to have an empty room guarded by cuirassiers. You could just hire them. Klein occasionally threw in something Eastern into his theories, a little Zen or the like – he was moved by such things, but I don’t think it was real mysticism.
Actually, I feel more affinity with American minimalism than with the Nouveau Réalisme of somebody like Klein. To me minimalism is simply the American version of ZERO. Only we didn’t get as plastic as they did. At least I never went beyond the relief. During the ZERO period my reliefs had to be white. That was just the dogma. Some of my Informal reliefs were grey. I just painted them white. That turned them into Nul pieces. At first they looked like baroque ceilings. I only started doing completely abstract work in 1955. My ideal was the pure white church. I probably started making those reliefs because I never went to kindergarten. I must have had some catching up to do . . . At one point I made papier-mâché castles for my son Japie. And I used that stuff for my reliefs as well. Boiling toilet paper and then smearing glue on it. The downside is that it took forever to dry; before I could use it properly, it would be covered in mould. Later I started using paint filler. That was a lot faster. I’d use a cardboard base and just stick the pieces of newspaper on top of it.
In 1962 I set out my operating principles in a text. I wrote it in English. There are a few mistakes in it, but it is the way I intended it to be. It’s about geometry, about simple geometry. You can criticize it. Maybe it’s a typical artist’s truth, whose opposite you could argue just as easily, but to me it was important. I wanted to achieve the greatest possible purity. That was why I didn’t use any colour. I wanted to avoid any form of hierarchy, any centre. For this reason my work has been called ‘democratic’, but as far as I’m concerned you could just as easily call it ‘fascist’. ‘Alles ist rein und sauber, nicht?’ It’s an odd phenomenon in abstract art that everybody can see something different in it. To many people my work invites con- templation. That’s fine, I don’t mind, however they interpret it.
For me this geometric structure is primarily a way of working, a method. Repetition creates a rhythm and makes it easier to think about the composition. I set up a drawing and the result comes naturally. But my drawings are not sterile or mechanistic. The strict methodology actually makes small deviations interesting. When you see them side by side, none is the same. And in fact I don’t want to exclude personality too drastically. Nul may have aimed to be as objective as possible, but ultimately all that work is as subjective as hell. Just look at the differences between Peeters, Henderikse, Armando and myself. The material, the pen, the paper: with me everything gets a chance. I see it as directed happenstance. I may have an idea of how I want a line to run, but sometimes my pen does the exact opposite. Sometimes it knows better than I do. You usually know while you’re working on it when a drawing isn’t going to work out. I throw a lot of stuff out. I’ve used too much black again for a particular drawing, for instance, and it’s dead.
I’ve never really had much to complain about when it came to success. But when I won the David Roëll Prize, I was really flattered. Not to mention the money was a nice plus. I used it to have my reliefs produced. I’d never have been able to do it all myself. At a certain point you have someone else make something for you and then you keep growing in that system. I deliver the drawing and they do the rest. In the beginning I would help a little, but now I leave it all up to assistants. My last assistant was a radio mechanic. I’ve also worked a lot with architecture and mathematics students. Above all they shouldn’t be too artistic: before you know it you get back a to- tally different thing.
Those architecture boys often have a tremendous affinity with the Zeroists. That comes from our attention to organization and structure, of course. In essence, they’re doing exactly the same thing, except that they’re bound by efficiency factors. And a lot of architects are into my work. They think it’d be great to fit it in. But I’ve never wanted to lend myself to that. I think a painting should remain a painting and not be absorbed in the totality of a building. My things are individual: that’s where it’s happening, and nowhere else. Yet I did do some commissioned work. I once made an Informal relief for the PTT, a really beautiful thing. It was intended as a wall piece, but I made so it could also function as a free-standing object. Good thing, too, because during some renovations they tore down the wall it used to cover. Not it’s just hung as a work of art, not quite lit correctly, but oh well.
Not only did I regularly get commissions, but my work was also bought by museums. I knew Leering,2 for instance, from when he was studying in Delft. He bought one of my reliefs quite early. And Sandberg always stimulated me. As for galleries, I’ve always said: they’re crooks, but you need them. Of course it’s a business; after all we live in a capitalist society. And who are the experts, who can best present the work? The gallery owners. When they come here you can tell they’re thinking, ‘this guy’s never seen a thousand guil- ders in one place before’. I’ve always found that hard to deal with, but fortunately I’ve worked with the same gallery owner for years.
My wife never wanted anything to do with the habit I developed later of going to Catholic masses, but I thought the rituals were beautiful. I especially loved Gregorian chant. When it’s done well, it’s very precise. What I also liked about that Catholic Church was the fact that it was a real people’s church. The riffraff shared the pews with the rich. I usually sat in the back with the heathens. I didn’t belong, but I enjoyed it.
What I’ve always tried to do is simply to exorcise my own restlessness, the most primitive form of psychology. The goal is actually supposed to be happiness, but in most cases it isn’t. With nothing but happiness you’d be bored to death. When I was a kid I used to think that when you go to heaven it’s always Sunday, and how horribly dull that would be. I was really worried about that. And hell? That’s not entirely clear yet.
In 1989, Diana Stigter and Pietje Tegenbosch had a conversation with Jan Schoonhoven, which is reproduced here. This text is an adapted version of the text published in Sjoerd van Faassen, Hans Sleutelaar (eds.), De Nieuwe Stijl 1959-1966 (Amsterdam: De Bezige Bij/The Hague: Neder- lands Letterkundig Museum en Documentatiecentrum, 1989). Jan Schoonhoven died in 1994.
Inspiration in White
I never wanted to be an artist. I can still remember the teacher, when I was in the sixth year at primary school, saying: ‘So you’re going to be a painter, right, Jantje?’ But I said, ‘No way, sir!’ I’ve never wanted to go through life as an artist. The idea that I should pursue a career as a painter has always been odd to me.
My job with the Dutch PTT meant I could work on my art at my own pace. The others weren’t financially dependent on their art either. We all had regular jobs. Armando worked for the Haagse Post newspaper, Peeters at the Gemeentemuseum in The Hague and Henderikse did all sorts of things. We were proper gentlemen, actually. To me that job meant order. You had to be on time. I would leave the house be- fore 7 a.m. so as not to have to rush to work. Everything took place according to a set rhythm; I’ve always felt a need for structure. The fact that we presented ourselves as a group came out of the Informal period, when we were already writing manifestos and all that sort of thing.
Armando liked to write. And he was good at it. Some of his slogans – like the one about art that isn’t art anymore – were almost a gospel for us. We wanted to provoke. The German Zero artists were also noted for that. In that respect the way had been prepared for us. We called our art Nul to distinguish it from Zero. Nul was just Dutch. And anyway 0 is a wonderful form: round, always good, and doesn’t mean anything more. Still, I usually talk about ZERO art myself – I almost never say Nul.
Initially there were five of us. When Kees van Bohemen left there were four, and when Jan Henderikse became a New Realist there were only three of us left. Three Germans and three Dutchmen for our ZERO exhibition at the Gemeentemuseum in The Hague. Armando’s contribution was his Zwart water (Black Water). It looked great, really enigmatic. A dark room, with a few lights here and there and a plat- form above the water. It was like you were walking alongside some- thing unfathomably deep. Only once the public had thrown too many coins in could you see the water wasn’t all that deep.
Peeters was always the linchpin of our group. He’d previously founded the Informals, of course. In hindsight you realize that it’s one continuous line of evolution. Nul’s place in history is secure now, and the Informal period too, but that took longer. Only after ZERO had become quite well-known did we realize that the Informal period had been the first stage, the true beginning. I hadn’t thought so previously, not at all. It looked so different, after all.
I met Henk Peeters shortly after the war. We would run into each other every once in a while. We’d go to the Pulchri parties together.1 They were usually quite fun. We always looked each other up, even after Henk moved to Arnhem. Jan Henderikse was a regular fixture in this house. We always got along pretty well, and as far as the make-up of the group: well, my goodness, Henk wanted to bring in Bouthoorn, for example, but he wasn’t an abstract painter. And Jan felt we should ask Armando to join. He was right about that, of course.
We were absolutely not an idealistic movement. The Germans were, but not us. Not even Peeters. We wanted to accept society as it was. So we got sponsors very early on. For our first Nul exhibition, Armando managed to get a car tyre manufacturer. And I used Histor paint to make my cut corrugated cardboard work. Henk used tins from a specific brand. We were all conscious of the fact that we were living in this society and that we had to accept that. Not that we did- n’t all have some form of social engagement, but the Germans were much more strident about it! Mack, Piene and Uecker were true idealists. I even said to Henk and Armando later: ‘Jesus, did you believe all that so literally?’ You can’t change anything with art. It’s about the moment; it’s about beautiful things. A good Rembrandt is still worth looking at, right?
It was really easy to make contact with the foreigners. I first met Manzoni at Hans Sonnenberg’s in Rotterdam. He was an aristocrat, and very wealthy to boot, which is not always the case for a count. Klein and Manzoni were a lot more philosophical than the Dutch. You would notice that most in Klein’s texts. He always had wonderful ideas. Think of that time he wanted to have an empty room guarded by cuirassiers. You could just hire them. Klein occasionally threw in something Eastern into his theories, a little Zen or the like – he was moved by such things, but I don’t think it was real mysticism.
Actually, I feel more affinity with American minimalism than with the Nouveau Réalisme of somebody like Klein. To me minimalism is simply the American version of ZERO. Only we didn’t get as plastic as they did. At least I never went beyond the relief. During the ZERO period my reliefs had to be white. That was just the dogma. Some of my Informal reliefs were grey. I just painted them white. That turned them into Nul pieces. At first they looked like baroque ceilings. I only started doing completely abstract work in 1955. My ideal was the pure white church. I probably started making those reliefs because I never went to kindergarten. I must have had some catching up to do . . . At one point I made papier-mâché castles for my son Japie. And I used that stuff for my reliefs as well. Boiling toilet paper and then smearing glue on it. The downside is that it took forever to dry; before I could use it properly, it would be covered in mould. Later I started using paint filler. That was a lot faster. I’d use a cardboard base and just stick the pieces of newspaper on top of it.
In 1962 I set out my operating principles in a text. I wrote it in English. There are a few mistakes in it, but it is the way I intended it to be. It’s about geometry, about simple geometry. You can criticize it. Maybe it’s a typical artist’s truth, whose opposite you could argue just as easily, but to me it was important. I wanted to achieve the greatest possible purity. That was why I didn’t use any colour. I wanted to avoid any form of hierarchy, any centre. For this reason my work has been called ‘democratic’, but as far as I’m concerned you could just as easily call it ‘fascist’. ‘Alles ist rein und sauber, nicht?’ It’s an odd phenomenon in abstract art that everybody can see something different in it. To many people my work invites con- templation. That’s fine, I don’t mind, however they interpret it.
For me this geometric structure is primarily a way of working, a method. Repetition creates a rhythm and makes it easier to think about the composition. I set up a drawing and the result comes naturally. But my drawings are not sterile or mechanistic. The strict methodology actually makes small deviations interesting. When you see them side by side, none is the same. And in fact I don’t want to exclude personality too drastically. Nul may have aimed to be as objective as possible, but ultimately all that work is as subjective as hell. Just look at the differences between Peeters, Henderikse, Armando and myself. The material, the pen, the paper: with me everything gets a chance. I see it as directed happenstance. I may have an idea of how I want a line to run, but sometimes my pen does the exact opposite. Sometimes it knows better than I do. You usually know while you’re working on it when a drawing isn’t going to work out. I throw a lot of stuff out. I’ve used too much black again for a particular drawing, for instance, and it’s dead.
I’ve never really had much to complain about when it came to success. But when I won the David Roëll Prize, I was really flattered. Not to mention the money was a nice plus. I used it to have my reliefs produced. I’d never have been able to do it all myself. At a certain point you have someone else make something for you and then you keep growing in that system. I deliver the drawing and they do the rest. In the beginning I would help a little, but now I leave it all up to assistants. My last assistant was a radio mechanic. I’ve also worked a lot with architecture and mathematics students. Above all they shouldn’t be too artistic: before you know it you get back a to- tally different thing.
Those architecture boys often have a tremendous affinity with the Zeroists. That comes from our attention to organization and structure, of course. In essence, they’re doing exactly the same thing, except that they’re bound by efficiency factors. And a lot of architects are into my work. They think it’d be great to fit it in. But I’ve never wanted to lend myself to that. I think a painting should remain a painting and not be absorbed in the totality of a building. My things are individual: that’s where it’s happening, and nowhere else. Yet I did do some commissioned work. I once made an Informal relief for the PTT, a really beautiful thing. It was intended as a wall piece, but I made so it could also function as a free-standing object. Good thing, too, because during some renovations they tore down the wall it used to cover. Not it’s just hung as a work of art, not quite lit correctly, but oh well.
Not only did I regularly get commissions, but my work was also bought by museums. I knew Leering,2 for instance, from when he was studying in Delft. He bought one of my reliefs quite early. And Sandberg always stimulated me. As for galleries, I’ve always said: they’re crooks, but you need them. Of course it’s a business; after all we live in a capitalist society. And who are the experts, who can best present the work? The gallery owners. When they come here you can tell they’re thinking, ‘this guy’s never seen a thousand guil- ders in one place before’. I’ve always found that hard to deal with, but fortunately I’ve worked with the same gallery owner for years.
My wife never wanted anything to do with the habit I developed later of going to Catholic masses, but I thought the rituals were beautiful. I especially loved Gregorian chant. When it’s done well, it’s very precise. What I also liked about that Catholic Church was the fact that it was a real people’s church. The riffraff shared the pews with the rich. I usually sat in the back with the heathens. I didn’t belong, but I enjoyed it.
What I’ve always tried to do is simply to exorcise my own restlessness, the most primitive form of psychology. The goal is actually supposed to be happiness, but in most cases it isn’t. With nothing but happiness you’d be bored to death. When I was a kid I used to think that when you go to heaven it’s always Sunday, and how horribly dull that would be. I was really worried about that. And hell? That’s not entirely clear yet.
In 1989, Diana Stigter and Pietje Tegenbosch had a conversation with Jan Schoonhoven, which is reproduced here. This text is an adapted version of the text published in Sjoerd van Faassen, Hans Sleutelaar (eds.), De Nieuwe Stijl 1959-1966 (Amsterdam: De Bezige Bij/The Hague: Neder- lands Letterkundig Museum en Documentatiecentrum, 1989). Jan Schoonhoven died in 1994.
