Left The Feeling As Normal 1972

Curator: This intriguing mixed-media drawing, "Left The Feeling As Normal," comes to us from the Dutch artist Anton Heyboer in 1972. It's an arresting combination of ink, monoprint, and other drawing techniques on paper. Editor: The name alone speaks volumes. But my gut feeling? This artwork whispers about confinement. Those rough, almost brutal, strokes make me feel trapped, though I couldn't tell you exactly why! It’s just a visual pressure I perceive right off the bat. Curator: Heyboer's personal history certainly informs that feeling. He lived a complex life, one marked by both personal tragedy and philosophical seeking, and those are key parts of the artist’s context that bleed into his works. We might want to look at the ways his art challenged conventional structures in society and in interpersonal relationships to deepen that idea of feeling trapped. Editor: Absolutely. It's as though the paper itself becomes a sort of cage and the images within are the emotions trying to break free, rendered crudely so you feel the scratchiness of the struggle. Like that almost absent-looking human shape on the left -- barely sketched into existence. Is it the figure that 'left the feeling'? What did that feeling look like on a body? It just throws questions at you, doesn’t it? Curator: It certainly invites interrogation. The interplay of abstraction and figuration presents us with a complex emotional landscape. How does Heyboer's engagement with themes of mental states align, do you think, with broader discussions around mental health and the deconstruction of normality prevalent in counter-culture circles? Editor: What a fascinating thought! Deconstructing 'normal,' then reassembling feeling into… whatever this beautifully tormented picture shows us. Maybe ‘normal’ means not letting those raw, uncomfortable feelings stay bottled up. That is such a Heyboer thing to offer. Curator: So we leave our listeners, hopefully, with some considerations regarding Heyboer's interrogation of selfhood in relation to a socially-contrived concept of feeling. Editor: Yes! I feel like "Left The Feeling As Normal" dares us to question our own boxes, you know? To ask what's being repressed inside ourselves, because as we have been circling, in the end, it is anything *but* normal!