About – Tienke Zijlstra

DRAWING INVENTIONS 2025

QUARTAIR, Toussaintkade 55, The Hague – February 27 to March 16, 2025 From February 27 to March 16, a group of artists will showcase an impressive variety of drawing art at Quartair. All participating artists have taken part in the Drawing Inventions Academy, Academy, a master program for professional artists. The works in this exhibition have been […]

PETRICHOR

PETRICHOR, Edition 11, Volume 6, November 2024 I had the opportunity to contribute to Petrichor edition 11, themed “METAMORPHOSIS”. Petrichor is a small-scale underground publisher of poetry, visual art, and other remarkable works, curated by Martin Knaapen & Marcel Herms. Petrichor aims to provide a platform for artists and writers who may not immediately appeal to the mainstream but certainly […]

ZOMERKABINET

GALERIE ART, Singel 100, Amsterdam – July 12 to September 15, 2024 Since 2013, Het Tekenkabinet has been an independent platform for contemporary, autonomous drawing art. TEKENKABINET XII consists of three parts: two exhibitions at beautiful locations in Amsterdam and an online webshop (https://www.tekenkabinet.nl/webshop/). Most participating artists will present a total of three drawings, though not all at once. For […]

Curriculum

CURRICULUM

Tienke Zijlstra (Meppel, 1982) lives and works in (north of) the Netherlands.

EDUCATION
2005 – 2012 Teacher of visual arts and Design (1th degree), Windesheim, Zwolle, the Netherlands.

2002 – 2004 Cultural and social education, Hogeschool van Amsterdam
1999 – 2002 Advertising designer, CIBAP Zwolle

COURSES/ MASTERCLASSES
2021 DIA (Drawing Inventions Academy): a master’s program led by a.o. Arno Kramer, Caren van Herwaarden and Marisa Rappard.
2017 Animation techniques, Digital Art Factory, Assen

NOMINATIONS
2022 Drenthe talent prize culture

SIDE ACTIVITIES
2022 – now Guest lecturer 2D, DBKV ArtEZ, Zwolle
2023 Production team Into Nature, Time Horizons, Borger – Odoorn
2022 Jurymember exhibition Kunstbende
2013 – 2022 Visual/CKV teacher VO, Vechtdal College, Ommen
2011 – 2013 Visual teacher workshops, Scala, Meppel
2009 Visual teacher, pre-education, DBKV, Windesheim, Zwolle
2002- 2004 Cultural youth work, production house, Amsterdam
2001 – 2002 Assistant photo studio/advertising design, Theo Berends, Emmen
2000 – 2001 Advertising design, Advice Advertising consultancy, Wijhe

EXHIBITIONS

2025 (upcoming) DRAWING INVENTIONS 2025, Quartair, The Hague (group)

2024 ZOMERKABINET, Great contemporary drawing art on small format, Gallery Art Singel 100, Amsterdam

2024 TEKENKABINET XII, Great contemporary drawing on small format, Project space BMB, Amsterdam

2024 BORROWED SPACES with Patrick Mangus, Anke Land, Teodora Ionescu, Curated by Ronald de Ceuster. Studio Building Panta Rhei, Deventer (group)
2023 TEKEN GREAT, Between culture and nature, with Sigrid van Woudenberg, Bas Ketelaars, Jeanne Rombouts, Monica Aerden, Geetrui van de Craats (Curator). Pictura, Dordrecht (group)
2023 ONTMOETING / Råka ut för, with Karin Gerfen, Contrapunt, Zwolle
2022 ONDERHUIDS, Studio NA64, with Femmie Duiven and Ursula Metzler, Amsterdam (group)
2022 INGREEP & OFFER with Lee Eun Young, Kunstlokaal No8, Jubbega (duo)
2022 NORTH NOW, Drawing Inventions, Horticultural School, Frederiksoord (group)
2022 SIGNED, CBK, Emmen (group)
2021 TEKENAARS IN DRENTHE, Kunst& Cultuur Drenthe, Assen (group)
2017 Reestzin, art and nature walk, Reestdal, de Wijk (group)
2016 Meantime, Plataan, Meppel (group)
2012 Graduationshow, Broerenkerk, Zwolle

PUBLICATIONS (contributed to)

2024 PETRICHOR, 11th edition, year 6, November

2024 Catalog Drawing Cabinet XI. Pocketsize (A5), 11th edition.

Directed indomitability

Tienke Zijlstra makes enormous drawings whose boundaries are defined by her own physical reach. Like a conductor, she waves and smears large sheets of paper with sponges, soaked in ink, far beyond the edges. Then the working out begins, refining, containing and emphasizing. In her recent work, lobbly, fleshy forms proliferate across the paper, growing, grabbing around, merging, enclosing, fighting, dominating, transforming: they seem indomitable. But not for Zijlstra, for however unstoppable and organically growing her work looks, she directs this corporeal inner world with the healing precision of a surgeon, without losing vitality.
You feel her work rather than understand it. You reach for your stomach without realizing it, you imagine yourself in the entrails of a gigantic beast, or is it yourself? Zijlstra’s work confronts you with your own body, with growing and bleeding, with processes that go on day and night. With the gruesome certainty that everything of value is vulnerable. And beautiful.

(text: Caren van Herwaarden)

My recent work

Email:

tienke.zijlstra@outlook.com

KvK: 80970494
Btw: NL003512688B24