the artist

ben van der wel

– visual artist, drawings, art on paper, silverpoint
– amsterdam-ish

– member of nederlandse kring van tekenaars (wikipedia)
– silverpoint advocate in the Netherlands: extensive tutorial and webshop zilverstift.nl
– founding member of dutch artist collective art allies 2023
– board member of dutch artist collective popinnart 2018-2022

– ran a let’s-visit-gallery-openings-together mailing list for fellow artists, now transformed to Instagram account @amsterdamgalleryopeningtracker with marlien venema. because high thresholds are to be overcome, art to be seen and colleagues to be met.

education:
– master of arts in johann wolfgang von goethe’s dilettantism theory (university of amsterdam)
– privately schooled in the visual arts by jan van der pol and rien monshouwer (both accomplished artists and former teachers at the royal art academy of the hague)
– obtained a typewriting certificate on a remington travel writer

personal:
– father and partner (the latter since last millennium)
– spent twelve years being paid to crawl on my knees between dusty antiquarian books, transformed it to a hobby
– used to climb quite high trees until a vicious attack by a rather large book took out my shoulder
– used to be a local rock band’s mascot in a long-forgotten era