The work of Marie Reintjes is based on a large collection of images. This visual database contains photographs she makes while strolling, visiting a concert, or viewing the Dutch landscape from a plane: images from everyday life. It also contains photographs from her parents’ photo albums, and shots taken by family and friends.

The snapshot style of photographing, which is characteristic for our time, is a starting point for her painting. Out of the big mash of ‘disposable’ images, often carelessly shot, she aims to find the gems. These are the everyday compositions that she places on a pedestal by painting them.

The images Reintjes uses are personal, sometimes even emotional, but the approach she chooses while painting is a formal one. She aims to paint with the same kind of swiftness that the photo was taken with. Using rapid movements of brush strokes, she finds it important to ‘get to the point’ and reach for the essence of the image. In doing so she leaves out unnecessary detail, which sometimes causes the representation to lean towards the abstract.