Willem Gerard Hofker

Seline Hofker and Gianni Orsini, Willem Gerard Hofker, Uitgeverij de Kunst, 2013, p. 151, fig. 194, pl. 307

Bruce Carpenter (a.o.), Willem Hofker 1902-1981: Schilder van/Painter of Bali, Wijk en Aalburg, 1993, p. 68 (illustrated, dated 1941)

Excellent overall condition as viewed. Any inconsistency is due to the artist's working method. Framed, under Plexiglass.
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Willem Gerard Hofker was born in The Hague in 1902 to a supportive father who detected and endorsed his son’s artistic flair at an early age.  He trained under Netherlandish artists at The Hague Academy of Art and the Royal Academy of Art in Amsterdam. With the encouragement of his wife Maria, whom he married in 1930, Hofker became an efficacious painter, etcher and draughtsman despite the Great Depression.

In 1938, the couple voyaged to the Dutch East Indies, immediately exploring West Java, Bogor and Bandung in search of artistic muses. Hofker was captivated by the untouched beauty of Javanese women, finding them ‘wonderful to behold, as picturesque as people in the 17^th century back home’ (Willem, 9 March 1938)[i]. However, he quickly determined that they were disinclined to pose for his paintings in observance of the conventions of their Muslim faith. Six months later, Hofker and his wife moved to the enchanting island of Bali, gratified to find considerable numbers of young, Hindu girls unwearyingly disposed to model for long durations.

The pair found themselves socializing with a burgeoning group of Indo-European painters such as Walter Spies, Rudolf Bonnet, Isaac Israels and Adrien Jean-Le Mayeur de Merpres, all enticed by the pristine splendor of the atoll. By 1940, war in the Netherlands compelled the couple to extend their stay, but the Japanese invasion of Bali in 1942 curtailed their ability to return home altogether.

This rare watercolor was painted in 1941 when they were living in Abangan, Ubud. Seldom did the artist produce watercolors during his time in Bali and very few are known to exist. Though the scene depicts a quintessentially Balinese setting, the manner in which Hofker places equal weight on the figure as he does on the landscape is similar to that of the artists from the Dutch Golden Age. Having studied art in the Netherlands, he was exposed to prevalent Dutch Genre paintings which portrayed the circadian life of people, irrespective of their social class. It was only natural for him to illustrate the daily happenings of Balinese villagers, but he was especially interested in those of young girls who would congregate by the majestic temple structures.

The complex arrangement of the components of the work was certainly premeditated: the posture of the leaning woman, together with her cascading sarong and tossed basket, creates a visual triangle. This triangle mirrors that of the larger one in which it is situated, formed by the elevated ingress and descending staircase. Centuries beforehand, Renaissance artists had found that utilizing compositional geometries enhanced their works with a harmonious symmetry, augmenting them with a sense of unity and strength. In the present lot, the larger triangle serves to lengthen the painting by driving the viewer’s gaze vertically. In the same vein, the eye is drawn, befittingly, to the sitter’s face, the pinnacle of the smaller triangle.

Apparently unmarried, as indicative of single women in Denpasar who arranged their hair swept to the side, a blithe and youthful glow emanates from her rounded countenance. Her downcast eyes and reposeful stance belie her mindfulness of being immortalized by the artist portraying her. Hofker, consonant with the canonical Phidian drapery previously used by the Greeks to depict sensual goddesses, paints the plentiful folds of her sarong which conceals her limbs while simultaneously adhering to them and revealing their contours. 

Unlike Spies and Bonnet who stylized their works, Hofker retained a strictly Western verisimilitude in his art. When one observes the application of light discernible throughout the composition of the work, it is easy to immediately deduce that the artist was trained in the Netherlands, where light and shading are ingrained in the artistic vocabulary, having already been mastered during the Dutch Golden Age. In this watercolor, a blanket of daylight pours in through the temple entrance, bathing the stony steps below. The sunshine illuminates the intricacies of relief work on the walls within the temple. By executing a subtle chiaroscuro, Hofker outlines the arms and shoulders of the girl, seated in the shade, with reflective light. The overall warm hues of sunset accentuated in yellows, reds and browns, are cooled by the lush blue leaves that appear hanging in the corner.

‘I feel so at home here. It is strange that all these beautiful things are still made here every day. Sometimes one is reminded of the Italian Rennaissance (…) or Roman reliefs (…); this thousand-year-old culture has achieved the same high standard of visual imagery.’ (Willem, 1 July 1938, Denpasar) [ii] Through this glorious watercolor, he summons the viewer to join his romanticized image of paradise, replete with indigenous architecture, copious foliage and the unadulterated beauty of the native Balinese woman.

¹ Seline Hofker and Gianni Orsini, Willem Gerard Hofker, Uitgeverij de Kunst, 2013, p. 24

² Refer to 1, p. 28