The concentration in those big blue eyes, that angelic patience of that angelic appearance, her fleeting smile when she has succeeded again. Whenever I look at Lisa Wiersma, I think: this woman could also have a completely different career, as a master forger. She is a painter and researcher, and she has an advantage The master’s secret (AVROTROS) before The Night Watch by Rembrandt imitated, The Milkmaid by Vermeer. And in two episodes this season she reconstructs ‘The Scream’ by the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch. A painting from 1893 showing a ghostly figure in front of what looks like an abyss, a bridge. The sky is red, the environment spins and turns. It is, says Lisa Wiersma, “feeling captured in paint.” And to get something comparable onto cardboard – the surface of The Scream – she had to understand what was going on in his head.
Her look reveals that she would rather know what his hands did. She looks at his paint strokes: firm. The texture of the paint: transparent and grainy in places. Its colours: cadmium yellow, vermilion, the green of chromium oxide. The paint is made with egg-based binder and casein, a residual product of milk. All this is figured out by the men around her. The materials historian, the restorer, the materials expert. She gets to work with what they provide. The curator of the Norwegian museum even undresses the masterpiece for her. “Come and see it in the flesh.” Stripped of the list, she is allowed to study it. And again, if she asks. The bare, naked painting looks simple, she notes, but is complex. It is fragile and vulnerable. “A nightmare for the curator,” says the curator. And, he encourages her, it is a nightmare for those who want to copy it.
We saw the result on Wednesday evening. Her Munch had the same dents, scratches, blemishes and retouches as the original. It seemed just as old and just as dusty. In the right corner the solidified drops of candle wax beaded as if Edvard Munch had spilled them. Reconstruction her work is explicitly mentioned. No copy and certainly no reproduction. You would just give people ideas. It’s a mystery to me why they don’t have this program. The secret of the mistress to call.
Spool knitting
From Art to Art is a matter of zapping a few channels. Wednesday evening, around the same time as The master’s secret we see seven Dutch people at least as intently and concentrated as Lisa Wiersma, tinkering with every square centimeter Small is beautiful (SBS6). These are “fanatic miniature builders,” says the voice of Simone Kleinsma. They make mini scenes with figures and homemade attributes on scale.
It’s fiddling and fiddling. We’ve seen people do it before on TV with balloons, with Lego, with dominoes and, yes, with food. So there is a market for that. For dabbling programs full of hassle. I have been busy with the professions of the participating miniature builders. I thought it really added something. There was a goldsmith there. An ophthalmology physician assistant. An automotive technician. You can easily understand where they got their dexterity and skills from. To a slightly lesser extent, this applies to the toy designer – who also made his mini things with the 3D printer. The game artist I’m sure he can come up with scenes well, and I’m still thinking about what the professional contribution of the gifted coordinator is.
I can also report that the largest miniature builder – Michel (44) of just under two meters – had to leave on Wednesday. I don’t think that was the essence of this program, but something else didn’t come to mind.