I am Patricia van Lubeck, born in Amsterdam, The Netherlands and presently living in the beautiful Bay of Plenty, New Zealand. This site shows a selection of my most recent art works. If you would like to purchase one of my works or want to be informed when new ones are added, feel free to email me or use the contact form.
I consider my work an invitation to explore the ways we experience our environment. My paintings have realistic elements, but above all an alienating atmosphere. My works in recent years show brightly colored landscapes and weird plant species which I call my ‘psychedelic gardens’.
My inspiration comes from the ordinary things around me, the artist in me just sees things in an unusual perspective. Picture a baker looking at a corn field. He sees bread, cookies and pies. I see shapes, patterns and colors. I like to zoom in on an everyday object such as the pins of a hair brush and imagine a tiny landscape with rows of hairy trees.
I’m a self-taught artist and seek to achieve a high level of craftsmanship. It takes me eight hours just to prepare the surface on my smaller canvases. The oil painting itself can take up to 10 layers to achieve rich colors and a smooth finish.
I am always trying to achieve high contrast within an unlimited color range. I love working with geometric patterns. Before I started painting on canvas, my cars have always been willing victims to this passion. Consequently patterns, natural or artificial, form the foundation of a lot of my images.
Due to my time-consuming technique I’m only able to create about 10 paintings a year. I love painting at night in my rural studio setting with no distractions – just the call of the ruru (a New Zealand native owl) to keep me company. I thrive on the repetitiveness of my patterns and feel the calming aura in concentrating with a small brush in my ‘psychedelic garden’.
Since 2002 I have exhibited in The Netherlands, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong.
Recent awards:
* Finalist NZ Painting and Printmaking Award 2007.
* Finalist James Wallace Art Awards 2006.
* Second prize, Tivoli Audio PAL Case design contest 2006. Read more about of my design TooHot and the creation of the prototypes.
Follow the link to my personal photo album to view pictures of the things I do when I am not painting.