Rose-ringed parakeet as muse – NRC

‘Brutal, bright green bolts that bring color to the gray Dutch winter.’ This is how writer Rascha once described Peper NRC the ring-necked parakeets, which fly around in increasingly larger groups in Dutch cities. The exotic green parrots, escaped or released here in the 1960s, also bring color to Dutch cultural life, now that an exhibition is opening in the Artkitchen gallery in Amsterdam entitled 50 Shades of Green. In it, artist Milo Rottinghuis – artist name Milo – brings fifty painted odes to the rose-ringed parakeet.

It is not just ringneck parakeets that he draws and paints. Although they are not strictly parrots, Milo calls them parrots, in which “man is represented.” And, according to the gallery: “This rose-ringed parakeet shows us secrets that we normally don’t dare to think about.” And that’s right.

Because since 2018 Milo has been self-publishing a special, beautiful, colorfully printed magazine entitled The Daily Parrot. In it he uses drawings, hand-lettered messages, stories and advertisements to report on the life his green birds lead in a parallel universe. It is fascinating, witty reading and a feast for the eyes, because Milo has the gift of making striking drawings with loose lines of the rose-ringed parakeets drinking whiskey, going to ‘Vaparotti’ concerts and visiting the museum.

This year’s issue is dedicated to art in the Milo’s green parrot universe. In a beautiful full-page drawing, for example, the Mona ‘parrot’ Lisa is attacked by green parrot visitors with mobile phones. Disturbing is the report of aClean Desk Police‘ parrot team, which raids offices and sweeps desks without being asked. Highlight in this ‘art special’ forming fifty colorful parrot paintings, the ’50 Shades of Green’, with ring-necked parakeets like ‘Marilyn Monroe’ and ‘Lucio Fontana’ cutting the canvas on which he is depicted. Those originals can be seen in Artkitchen gallery. “We want to bring some humor to these dark times,” says Milo about the exhibition, which will also feature cardboard images by fellow cartoonist Hein de Kort and films by Maarten Mater.

“My daily illustration work, for magazines like The green and NRC, is always on the short track. So spend a year working on a ringneck parakeet project like The Daily Parrot I love it. You can fantasize about things, sort things out, make paintings.” He was advised in the development of his magazine by designer Piet Schreuders, known for magazines such as the Poezenkrant and Furore. Milos The Daily Parrot is a graphic ode to the imagination and the rose-ringed parakeet. And so this bird once again enriches the culture of the Low Countries. For as early as 1463, Jan van Eyck painted a green ring-necked parakeet on his Madonna panel with canon Joris van der Paele, as a symbol of ‘liberated soul, detached from the sinful body’.

Exhibition 50 Shades of Green with Milo, Hein de Kort and Maarten Mater, Galerie Artkitchen, Hemonylaan 6a, Amsterdam. 17 Dec. until 20 Jan.