NO MAN’S TIME
I am a specialist in beauty. I have set myself a program:
to seek happiness and friendship in my works. In this way, I stand against irony and cynicism. I do not know what interest I have in love. The same as everyone else, I imagine. I evoke pleasant things, friendship and love. I do not know what my motivation is. It might well be frustration.
I began using flowers when I was searching for a symbol of friendship, and I have not found anything better so far. Yet I am not a child of the sixties nor close to nature. I know nothing about flowers, but I like decoration—decorative patterns, symmetry, wallpaper, and children’s room decoration.
Beauty appears there with great force. It is so seductive. I have always tried to be friendly, and I look for friendship in others. I would like to give form to these things, to make them visible. And what comes out of it is something shocking. My wall paintings resemble monsters, but that is also very exciting. My passion for these subjects and the reactions they might provoke push me to make these works. I have tried to make a bad painting and placed it next to a better one to see whether one can tell the difference between good and bad. It is especially difficult because I take no pleasure in making bad works.
Lily van der Stokker.
