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A closer look at Els van Westerloo
Els van Westerloo's bronze males and animals mark a technical watershed which has influenced her design as well, as you will see. Having successfully completed the Ceramics course at the Rietveld Design Academy in Amsterdam, Els's career took off in 1971. She devoted the first couple of years exclusively to abstract works into which figurative elements eventually started to make a gradual appearance, although the abstract remained a prominent characteristic as demonstrated, inter alia, by the fact that she referred even to the last ceramic sculpture she made as a "shape" (the word she has always used to describe all abstract sculptures). Human elements - a hand, a head - gradually crept into her work. Characteristically, the figures were in combat with the shape with which they were joined together, leaving undecided whether the shape was one of hiding or setting free. There was another reason, and one of a technical nature, as to why these cultural shapes remained at issue, which was that the transformation from clay to completed ceramic sculpture did not allow certain things: had it been possible simply to stand a male figure, or an ostrich, on its own two legs - there is the weight of the raw clay itself to be considered, never mind the firing of brick clay, which is done at temperatures approximating the melting point of the actual material - the resultant sculpture would probably have turned out too fragile to survive for any length of time. For many years Els's ceramic sculptures with their complex shapes were created at the "Atelier Steengoed" studio, a studio-cum-shop which is usually manned by four ceramic artists. She also worked as a private tutor for many years, both at her own initiative and within the curriculum offered by the "Stichting Crea" foundation. From time to time she retreated to the French Pyrenees, where she eventually decided to make a permanent home for herself, partly in connection with which she moved on to making bronzes. Her first bronze sculptures show clearly what she had until then been unable to do using clay: sculptures such as a male making a handstand, or an ostrich on one leg, speak volumes as to her deliverance from her former technical restrictions. However, every technique comes with its own limitations - in her case, the minute detail of her wax models, which pose virtually insurmountable problems to the bronze caster so that every sculpture requires extensive post-casting treatment to whip it into the appropriate shape. This confers virtually unique status upon Els van Westerloo's bronzes. |