Hanneke Rijks (1963, Netherlands) studied mathematics at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam but switched to the Amsterdam furniture making school because developping more practical skills gave her more pleasure. After finishing her study in 1990, she started her own furniture conservation and restoration studio in Amsterdam and now regularly works on projects for museums, antique dealers and governmental agencies. A few years ago, using her fine wood working skills, she started making art objects based on optical illusions, geometric patterns, paradoxes and puzzles.
Birch plywood and a wide variety of wood veneer are her preferred materials to work with. She often uses the stripes formed by the layers of plywood to “draw” and create illusions of depth. Her objects are mostly two-dimensional, but from a distance appear as three-dimensional. Her designs are often constructed from straight lines and triangular, square and hexagonal shapes, clearly showing her mathematical background.
Hanneke admires international artists such as René Magritte and Oscar Reutersvärd and of course Dutch artists M.C. Escher and Jeroen Henneman, all creating fantastic art which requires good observation to understand what one is exactly looking at. She feels that she has succeeded in making good works of art when people see her objects and after a brief moment of looking are a little amazed and surprised by it. Her work has been widely exhibited in galleries and a few museums in The Netherlands.
