Cor Jaring - gelatin silver print: Robert Jasper Grootveld

Gelatin silver print from the 1960s by Cor Jaring of Robert Jasper Grootveld. Photo dimensions: H14.5 x W10.5cm. The work bears a studio stamp on the back by the artist. The authenticity of the offered work is fully guaranteed. A certificate of authenticity can be emailed upon request after purchase and payment.

Robert Jasper Grootveld (Amsterdam, July 19, 1932 – Amsterdam, February 26, 2009) was a Dutch artist who became best known for his happenings at the Spui in Amsterdam. Grootveld was a forerunner of the Provo movement, which he later joined.

Grootveld was the son of Frits Grootveld (Frederik Johannes Cornelis Grootveld), an Amsterdam carpenter and furniture maker and member of the freethinker association De Dageraad. In 1954, Grootveld became an ice cream vendor and earned a good living, but was dissatisfied. During a bicycle trip to Paris by cargo bike, he realized that he wanted to become famous. First, he made a foray into journalism: commissioned by Jan Vrijman, he conducted research among the followers of Lou de Palingboer. Afterwards, Grootveld became a window cleaner for the Hirsch building on Leidseplein, and in 1961 he became an anti-smoking magician, as he called himself. On all kinds of posters advertising cigarettes, he placed a large letter 'K' (for cancer). In December 1961, he was arrested and imprisoned for this. Subsequently, he organized demonstrations, so-called 'happenings', in a workshop belonging to Nicolaas Kroese on Korte Leidsedwarsstraat in Amsterdam, which had been renamed an 'anti-smoking temple'. Among the spectators were Harry Mulisch and Ramses Shaffy. A few weeks after its inauguration, Grootveld accidentally set the temple on fire. He was sentenced to a suspended prison sentence for this. During this period, Grootveld was also in contact with Bart Huges, with whom he designed a symbol – an apple in a triangle – for Amsterdam as a magical center in the delta. Grootveld, by his own account captivated by Sinterklaas since the age of three, had already been preaching for several years that "Klaas is coming." From 1964 onwards, Grootveld's happenings took place on the Spui. Strangely dressed, Grootveld danced around the statue of Het Lieverdje in a cloud of his own cigarette smoke, while shouting all kinds of incantations that were taken up by the audience. The most famous were: "Cough, cough, cough" and "Klaas is coming." In these ceremonies, he made himself, by his own account, an exhibitionist of his own addiction: by ritualizing his own addiction, he addressed the larger societal addictions of the consumer society and the power of advertising and media within it—the 'publicity, publicity, publicity'. In 1966, Grootveld founded the so-called 'Klaasbank', and on November 3, 1966, he inaugurated a speakers' corner in the Vondelpark. With the painter Theo Kley, he founded the Exotic Kitsch Conservatory, which later evolved into the Insect Sect/the Expertological Laboratory, in which Aat Veldhoen, Simon Vinkenoog, Max Reneman, and Ernst Vijlbrief were also involved. As early as 1955, Grootveld developed into a raft builder. However, his first raft, Freya, constructed from waste found in the canals, was towed to the landfill by the municipality. He constructed his later "floating gardens" from blocks of Styrofoam wrapped in synthetic fabric, after which a net was tied around the whole structure. Soil was dumped onto the rafts so that plants could grow. The Zeeburg district used some of his floating gardens for the redevelopment of the Eastern Docklands. Grootveld spent the last years of his life in the Sint Jacob nursing home, where he passed away in February 2009. He was buried at Zorgvlied Cemetery.