Holling Clancy Holling and me

Holling Clancy Holling and me

On my 7th Birthday my Grandfather, Henk Oostenrijk from the Netherlands, sent me a book voucher.

My Mother and Father took me to a book store in Auckland City where I chose “Seabird,” a beautiful, hard cover book for children written and illustrated by Holling Clancy Holling and published by Collins on the subject of Whaling. My Mother dedicated the book for me by writing my birth date and my Grandfather’s name on the flyleaf.

I no longer have that original copy. It was donated without my knowledge or approval to a local school, fund raising book auction when my children were still attending primary school.

It did solve my Father’s problem of what to give me for my 8th birthday. My obsession that year with “Seabird” gave him the cue. I received from him a copy of “Paddle to the Sea.”

The following year it was “Tree in the Trail”

http://books.google.co.nz/books?id=fjLWevyUu0cC&printsec=frontcover&dq=seabird+Holling+Clancy+Holling&source=gbs_similarbooks_s&cad=1#v=onepage&q&f=false

Those three books changed my life forever. Long before I fully appreciated the literary contents of those books I was gazing in awe at Holling’s illustrations, many of which I copied. Not only that, I began to build my own canoes, models at first and then, on to the real thing.

Like Holling, I had a curiosity about many things and this lead to an interest in the canoes and the people of the Pacific Ocean.

I was compelled to make sailing models of outrigger canoes, whittled out of the dry, woody flowering stems of the flax plant that flourishes in the coastal areas of New Zealand. My friends and I would send them racing across the bay and watch them diminish, longingly, wondering where they might eventually end up, as they dwindled from sight; out to sea.

My first real canoe was designed by New Zealand designer, Frank Pelin and built to his plans by my father and me. That canoe was a 15 foot, plywood, hard chine adaptation of an American Indian birch bark canoe. I named that canoe “Seabird,” the canoe taught me about boat handling from a very young age. I used two types of paddle, the double Eskimo kayak style and the other, the traditional single paddle. My friends and I cruised the sheltered local waterways north of Auckland where we fished and camped all summer long.

Again much influenced by Holling’s realist style and parallel to his path, I chose a career as a commercial graphic artist and mural painter, which eventually lead to sculpture as well. These activities, though not my true passion, helped me to put food on the table for my family.

As I write this I am now in my 50’s and I still cherish and collect copies of Holling’s work. I haunt the children’s section of secondhand bookshops and charity shops always on the lookout for another, yet unseen Holling publication. In this way I have found a 1935 first edition of  “The Book of Indians” a later Collins republication of the same title and a 1948 fist edition Houghton Mifflin copy of “Seabird”.

My continuing curiosity about Holling lead me to Walt Giersbach’s blog which seeks to illuminate that which was previously unknown about the life and work of Holling C. Holling and his wife Lucille. Now, thanks to the efforts of people like Joan Hoffman of Michigan and others, details and artifacts from Holling’s life are being collected, displayed, recorded and published so that more may benefit from Holling’s rich legacy, the body of work that he left for our benefit and enjoyment.

Thanks Holling C Holling for daring to follow your dream and so influence the lives of people like me so far away here in New Zealand.

Joan Hoffman, Holling’s biographer wrote me recently:

August 2010

Harmen,

Glad you made contact with Walt.

You and Holling would have had much in common. He had an early interest in canoeing and became very skilled at it. In the Holling Collection is one of his early drawings of a horse drawn at age three.

Holling became a bit better off financially after he wrote and illustrated Paddle-to-the-Sea and the four Houghton Mifflin Co. books that followed (Tree in the Trail, Seabird, Minn of the Mississippi and Pagoo). Before that he did a great deal of advertising and commercial art to put food on the table. He even worked for Walt Disney at times for a pay check. The children's books he wrote before Paddle were done as a sideline. There are about 20+ books Holling either wrote and illustrated or others he illustrated for other authors.

Holling was a talented writer as well as an artist. He wrote some poetry. One of his great assets was a supportive wife. She helped in so many ways. And he had an outgoing personality and could talk with young and old in all walks of life. He had a curiosity about many things.

You won't see any of Holling's work after Pagoo (published in 1957), although he lived until 1973. Unfortunately he developed Parkinson's with dementia. He worked on several other ideas but never completed them.

Joan Hoffman

Yvonne Rust Never Sleeps

Last June I was invited by the organisers of the Quarry Arts Centre in Whangarei to participate in an art exhibition called "The great Plate, 100 artists 100 plates."

http://s764.photobucket.com/albums/xx286/QuarryArtsCentre/The%20GreatPlate%202010/?start=all

This is an imaginative fund raising campaign whereby selected artists donate their time to embellish a raw, fired, unglazed plate.
Mine came in Mid June in a cardboard courier box well protected with industrial bubble wrap.

I imagined what I might do to contribute the maximum return for the gallery. This decision turned me away from themes of self exploration and political statement to featuring what I have done for many years, portraiture.

It did not take me long to decide on a portrait of the woman after whom the gallery was named, Yvonne Rust. There are very few images of her extant which limited my references.



















I found an image in a Whangarei Library photo archive by photographer Florence Keene of Whangarei.
I'm grateful for the online archive. http://collections.whangarei-libraries.com/catalogs.php/39?page=4

I rendered the image on my plate using an aquarelle pencil in a mid tan/ochre colour for the facial skin tones and an HB pencil for the hair, tunic and facial details and contrasts.

Stylistically this duochrome drawing is similar in method to that used by Hendrick Goltzius in 17th C Holland.

Lastly I fixed the image with lacquer fixative. The plate went back into the courier packaging which I then sent back with the courier to the gallery in Whangarei.

Imagine my dismay and disappointment when Amanda from the Quarry art Gallery e mailed me to inform me that my plate was in two pieces, broken during its journey by courier.

Julie had warned me to deliver it personally to ensure that it got there in one piece! Even the courier driver joked as he handed the package over to Amanda that he hoped it wasn't broken. What did he know?

Fortunately Amanda is a jeweller with a gentle touch. She set about repairing the break with clear, conservation grade epoxy resin. I have yet to see the result though I believe from what Amanda tells me that it is a discrete repair with only a fine line showing.

To add to this story, recently I visited with close friends who lived and worked with Yvonne. They both told me that they were not surprised to learn that the plate had broken. They too had an exploding vessel episode associated with an Yvonne Rust painting and a large glass bowl. They told me that Yvonne hated to have her image taken which explains why I could find so few references of her.

So Yvonne if you are out there I'm glad to have made your aquaintence through your work, your friends and your students. I hope we meet again sometime.

best

Harmen R Hielkema

Arien Hielkema's latest digital project

Arien has virtually completed his course at Auckland's Media Design School.
This is one of his end of year projects.

Digital rendering created by my son Arien J Hielkema

Blackadder "Have you never heard of Irony Baldrick?"
Baldrick. "Yeah I have, it's like goldy or silvery"

Three new portrait comissions by Harmen R Hielkema

Jeen Oostenrijk: H, HB, 2B, 3B Pencil on paper
500 x 350 mm



















Lyn: Aquarelle coloured pencil on water colour paper.




















Eric: Pencil (F, HB, 2B & 3B) on paper 500mm x 350mm

Another G.H. Elliott watercolour emerges

Since I published the restoration of the G.H. Elliott water colour "Mountain Mists" I have been approached by the owner of a beautiful river scene painted by Elliott in 1885.
Like the one I restored the frame is dilapidated but in the case of this painting, (also mounted on board with gum arabic) it is in remarkably good condition.
For the sake of documentation I have decided to publish an image of this painting on my blog.
I wonder how many more there are out there?

Restoration of Yvonne Rust painting.

Valley of lilies: by Yvonne Rust. Acrylic on linen and oil tempered hardboard, 93 x 88 cm.
Before restoration by Harmen Hielkema

This painting by New Zealand artist Yvonne Rust is one of her earlier works from her Northland, Opua period and is one of a series of lily paintings.
The scene is of a valley surrounded by trees, white arran lilies feature in the fore and middle grounds. The canvas is of raw unprimed linen glued onto oil tempered hardboard. In the painting of this work Yvonne chose acrylic as her medium. She layered it on straight from the tube in an energetic and impressionistic style.

I believe that the finished painting spent some time folded up before it was glued to the board. Evidence of this lies in the obvious fold damage visible as two vertical lines bisecting the painting vertically where the paint has cracked and flaked off the linen substrate.

This painting features regular areas of bare or exposed linen where her brush has either missed or been dragged dry over the surface. In other areas the paint has been loaded on to the extent that as it dried over time it has become brittle showing long cracks.

I have consolidated the loose paint with PVA resin and cleaned the entire surface with a combination of methyl alcohol and water with a small dilution of potassium and sodium hydroxide.

Surface contaminants appeared to consist of mold, dust and insect spots which were removed with minimal disruption to the painted surface.

It was then considered appropriate to varnish the surface to further consolidate the paint and to protect it from further dirt infiltration.

In discussion with the owner it was decided that a mat varnish would best suit the piece to retain it's original overall appearance. Two coats of varnish were applied.

The finished result is not a startling transformation, however its long term survival is now assured. To further protect the piece I have recommended that it be re framed behind glass.


















Valley of lilies: by Yvonne Rust. Acrylic on linen and oil tempered hardboard, 93 x 88 cm.
After restoration by Harmen Hielkema. 18th August 2008