I was trained to see colors from an early age. It’s the bold color combinations that grab my attention. As my mother used to point out  the colors around me, in my work I use snapshots from my daily life in which color are central. My daughter’s feet in my confetti socks on our purple-blue staircase. A bright yellow tulip among all kinds of spring greenery. My red-painted toenails in colored sandals among my houseplants.

I process these images in collages. While painting and drawing I add pieces of painting, or cut out what doesn’t work. It gives me freedom to combine paper, canvas and oil paint with egg tempera, oil pastel and colored pencil. Depending on what gives the best color.

The experience of motherhood is central to the work. In a broad context, my work is about feminine power, fertility and the experience of having a child. It is the female artist, like Paula Modersöhn Becker and Mary Cassatt, who inspire me. On smaler level I watch my daughter’s hands and feet discover the world. A world in which I take her through my preferences, colors and interests. My work is therefore an ode to the mother-child relationship. A manual for my daughter about life as a woman and an expression of love in one.

Britt Dorenbosch (Oude Wetering, 1986) lives and works in Utrecht. After obtaining her master’s degree in sociology, she graduated in 2013 from the HKU University of the Arts Utrecht. In 2016 she won the K. F. Hein Stipendium and subsequently had a solo exhibition at the Centraal Museum in 2017. Her work is part of, among others, the collection of Museum Voorlinden.