Nynke van Zwol (1972) graduated from the Wackers Academy of Fine Art Amsterdam, The Netherlands, in 2015.

Before studying Art, she graduated in Linguistics and has worked for several years as a clinical and forensic linguist. Language has always been an important factor in her life and work.

Her fascination with ancient undeciphered scripts has led to the construction of her own asemic script. Asemic writing is meaningless on purpose, but is universally recognizable as language and evokes a sense of wonder in the viewer: “What does it mean?” This wonder is exactly what the artist wants to achieve.

The artist has developed a unique method of working. She dyes paper with watercolor or Chinese ink, using the wet-in-wet technique. After drying and pressing the paper, she paints asemic characters on it.

Her paintings often take the shape of scrolls or book pages. She finds her inspiration for these shapes in medieval European manuscripts, antique Arabic calligraphy and old Japanese scrolls.

 

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Education

Fine Art, Wackers Academy of Fine Art Amsterdam, 2015

Speech and Language Pathology, Hogeschool Utrecht, 2005

Linguistics, Leiden University, 1998

Arabic, Leiden University, 1995

Philosophy, Leiden University, 1995