Tijs Dragtsma (1992) - Amy in Scratched Light

A woman's face with a tall beehive and closed eyes emerges from a field of fine white scratches against pure black, bent toward a vintage ribbon microphone. The winged eyeliner and the beehive point to Amy Winehouse. She stands at the microphone with her eyes closed, caught in the single breath before a note leaves her. Nothing here asks to be recognised at a glance. The beehive, the winged eyeliner, the hush of a voice about to rise, these arrive slowly, the way a song does, note by note rather than all at once. The work keeps only what the moment needs. Her face is held as a field of fine, individual marks, catching and releasing light across the brow, the closed lids, the curve of the mouth near the microphone. The hair, the shoulder, the room around her are allowed to fall back into pure black. Nothing is described in full. What survives is gesture, not likeness, and that is where the feeling lives. No paint. No print. No ink. The image is formed by controlled scratches worked directly into the surface of the acrylic glass, a field of marks that becomes a face the way grain becomes a photograph, through accumulation rather than drawing. The damage is the portrait. The image is always present, in daylight as much as under a focused lamp. Light does not create it. It sharpens it, the scratches catching and releasing light so the contrast deepens and the face gathers presence. Seen from across a room it reads as a monumental, almost sculptural presence in black and white. Close up, it dissolves into the field of marks that built her. There is a quiet honesty in choosing to picture her with her eyes closed. A voice this known is usually met face on, eyes open, performing for the room. Here she turns inward instead, and the portrait follows her there, built from removal, from a surface given up rather than filled in, closer to how a voice like hers was heard than seen. Amy in Scratched Light continues the Art with Scratch series by Tijs Dragtsma, in which imagery is constructed through controlled surface damage rather than pigment or print. A visual language where damage is not destruction, but structure. This work is unique. "Not sung into the light, but out of it." About Art with Scratch Art with Scratch is a body of work in which the image is not drawn, but released. Carved line by line into a deep black surface, each work emerges through countless precise scratches that catch the light and bring form out of darkness. From a distance, the image appears almost photographic. Powerful, recognisable and full of presence. Yet up close, the work dissolves into a dense field of individual marks. Fine, fragile and almost weightless. What seemed solid reveals itself as a delicate web of lines, each one a deliberate gesture, each one essential to the whole. Light does not create the image. It sharpens it. The black surface absorbs, while the scratched lines reflect. As light shifts across the surface, the image breathes. From one angle the figure stands clear and defined. From another it softens and settles back toward the darkness from which it came, without ever disappearing. Under a focused spotlight, the contrast deepens and the image takes on a sculptural, almost luminous quality. What makes this medium so compelling is its quiet tension. The act of scratching is direct and irreversible. Every line is a decision that cannot be undone. Yet the result is not harsh. It is intimate, atmospheric and alive with movement. Hardness becomes softness. Destruction becomes creation. Absence becomes presence. In works such as this portrait, the figure is never fully fixed. Through the interplay of line, light and shadow, the image shifts with perspective and atmosphere. At certain moments, the subject seems to step forward out of the black. At others, it settles back into stillness. It is within that movement, between sharpness and calm, that the work comes alive. Like all materials touched by time, the surface carries its own quiet life. Each scratch holds a moment, a breath, a gesture. Together they form not just an image, but a presence, one that continues to reveal itself with every change of light. About the Artist My name is Tijs Dragtsma, founder of TD Fine Art Studio. As an artist, I am driven by a constant desire to explore new visual languages. I do not see art as a fixed style, but as an evolving field of discovery where material, structure, light and emotion come together. My work often begins with a simple question. How can a material speak in a new way. How can hardness become intimacy. How can precision create emotion. That search lies at the heart of everything I create. Within TD Fine Art Studio, each body of work is approached as its own world, with its own logic, atmosphere and visual identity. Some works are built through rhythm, repetition and structure. Others emerge through absence, shadow, reflection or tension. What connects them is a shared commitment to originality, clarity and emotional presence. I am fascinated by contrast. Between strength and fragility. Between control and feeling. Between what is visible and what is left open to interpretation. My goal is not simply to make an image, but to create a work that holds attention, invites reflection and continues to reveal itself over time. TD Fine Art Studio is the space in which these explorations come together. It is not only a studio, but an evolving artistic universe shaped by curiosity, precision and the ambition to create work that feels distinctive, intentional and alive.

Stima:€3,500

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