Berend Boorsma Dutch, 1977

Berend Boorsma (b. 1977, Vlaardingen, The Netherlands) is a Dutch painter living and working in Haarlem. His practice explores the relationship between abstraction, perception and the underlying structures that shape both nature and human experience. Through a contemplative approach to painting, Boorsma creates works that encourage a slower and more attentive way of looking.

Working between abstraction and representation, he develops compositions that emerge through an intuitive and process-driven methodology. Geometric forms, subtle colour transitions and layered textures interact within carefully balanced pictorial spaces, evoking associations with landscape, architecture and organic growth without becoming explicitly descriptive. Light, atmosphere and materiality play a central role in the construction of each work.

A longstanding interest in Taoist philosophy informs Boorsma’s artistic practice. Concepts such as balance, transformation and interconnectedness resonate throughout his work, while his dedication to Tai Chi has shaped his understanding of painting as an evolving dialogue between intention and spontaneity. Rather than following a predetermined image, each composition develops gradually through a sustained engagement with the material process.

Working primarily with tempera and oil paint, Boorsma builds his surfaces over extended periods of time. Layers of colour and texture accumulate slowly, creating paintings that combine a strong physical presence with a quiet sense of luminosity. The resulting works reveal a refined sensitivity to rhythm, space and visual balance.

While echoes of Symbolism, Cubism and early Modernist painting can occasionally be perceived within his visual language, Boorsma’s work remains firmly rooted in a contemporary exploration of perception and experience. His paintings invite reflection on the relationship between form, material and the natural world, offering viewers moments of stillness and contemplation within an increasingly accelerated environment.