Ernst Vijlbrief - Amsterdam - Provo - 1959 olieverf "zomeravond Toscane" gesigneerd - Sold

Ernst Vijlbrief (Utrecht, November 25, 1934 – Amsterdam, December 27, 2010) was a Dutch visual artist and board member of several artists' associations, including the Professional Association of Visual Artists.

Vijlbrief[1] received his training at the Institute for Applied Arts Education in Amsterdam and at the Academia di Porta Romana in Florence (1956-1959). He worked in Ibiza and in Paris in the late 1950s. In early February 1961 he married Sylvia Sluyter, daughter of the Amsterdam painter Gerard Sluyter and former lover of Lucebert.[2]

In 1961 he took part in the group exhibition Younger Dutch Painters, Sculptors and Architects: Liga Nieuw Beelden in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, and in the same year the publication Spel en Nederlaag at the Posthoorn in The Hague was created in collaboration with the poet Simon Vinkenoog. Around 1965 he gave guest lectures at the Ravensbourne College of Art in London.

In the 1960s he was part of the Provo generation in Amsterdam and was involved in happenings, such as the expert laboratory with Jasper Grootveld, Theo Kley, Max Reneman and Aad Veldhoen, among others, photographed by Cor Jaring. He was already active in the 1950s at the Art Love Society in Utrecht and at the end of the 1960s he became a board member of the Professional Association of Visual Artists (BBK) in Amsterdam. In 1969 he took part in 'BBK actions', such as the one in which wall newspapers were pasted at the entrance of the Stedelijk Museum. He also acted in the 'TV game of 4 hours': Nee Wereld, Ja Wereld; Government and avant-garde of the fictitious Eastern bloc country Oritle. He was co-founder of the Kiev Conservatoire Ooriejum. In 1973 he was co-founder of the Bond van Beeldende Kunstwerkers (BBKA) based in Utrecht with Bob Bonies.

From 1974 to 1989 he was a teacher at the AKI in Enschede. In 1975 he was the initiator of the artists' collective Universal Moving Artists, which exhibited in the 'new wing' of the Stedelijk Museum. Later he played a leading role in the founding of the Stichting Samenwerking Amsterdamse Kunstsverenigingen (SAK). His work was among others on display during the studio exhibitions Public Works in Ruigoord. He was interested in Eastern philosophy and Chinese painting and gave lessons as a Tai chi teacher.

He made landscapes and self-portraits, among other things. He worked in different techniques such as: drawing, watercolor, collage, gouache, Indian ink, oil paint and graphics: etching. He also made calligraphic improvisations on paper.

His painting style in the 1950s is expressionistic, in line with that of Cobra, for example the canvas Nagasaki (1960).[6]

Around 1968 he made series of figurative drawings. In 1970 he made the sculpture De Kapitein, an allusion to Edy de Wilde as director of the Stedelijk Museum, which was shown in Galerie Kristiaan in Amsterdam. In 1971 he painted large abstract canvases with geometric mandalas.