Tijs Dragtsma (1992) - Brando Among the Embers

lot/tijs dragtsma 1992 brando among the embers ddeKwAZ 633369151 / Price history

lot/tijs dragtsma 1992 brando among the embers ddeKwAZ 633369151

For saleAuction results

lot/tijs dragtsma 1992 brando among the embers ddeKwAZ 633369151

For saleAuction results

Bring your auction to collectors worldwide!

Get listed now

Tijs Dragtsma (1992) - Brando Among the Embers

A face surfaces out of total black, heavy lidded, composed, carrying the weight of a man who has stopped needing to raise his voice. Grey hair catches first, then brow and cheekbone, built from a field of fine scratches that hold the light the way skin holds a lifetime. Everywhere else, the black stays black. Suit, background, the room itself, all of it is left untouched, so the only thing permitted to exist is the face and the two hands cradling something soft against a chest built for armor. That contrast is the whole story. The cat is barely there, a few pale marks suggesting warmth in hands that could just as easily close into a fist. The rose at the lapel catches its own small patch of light, a tenderness pinned to a man who deals in fear. Nothing here is decorative. Every passage of light is doing the work that a brushstroke or a camera flash would do in another medium, except there is no pigment, no print, no ink involved. No paint. No print. No ink. The image is scratched into the surface of the acrylic glass. Seen from across a room, the work reads as a single commanding presence, monumental, unmistakable, an old world authority caught mid thought. Up close it dissolves into a field of individual marks, a surface that looks worked by hand and time rather than by any single gesture. The image is always present, with or without direct light. Light does not create it. It sharpens it, deepens the contrast, lets the eyes hold their heaviness a little longer. The subject carries its own mythology, the aging patriarch, the quiet menace, the softness he allows only in private. Holding the cat is an old cinematic shorthand for power that chooses when to show gentleness, and the piece leans into that tension rather than resolving it. Power and tenderness share the same hands here, and neither one wins. This work 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. "Even in the dark, he is still watching." 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.

Estimate:£2,951.15

Sold for:-