Ernst Vijlbrief - Unique 2/5 own edition Etching - Untitled. - 1963 - signed in pencil - Sold

• Ernst Vijlbrief received his education 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 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 Dederlaag was created in collaboration with the poet Simon Vinkenoog at the Posthoorn in The Hague. Around 1965 he gave guest lectures at the Ravensbourne College of Art in London. He was part of the Provo generation in Amsterdam in the 1960s and was involved in happenings, such as the expertological laboratory with Jasper Grootveld, Theo Kley, Max Reneman and Aad Veldhoen, among others, photographically captured by Cor Jaring. He was already active in the 1950s with the Genootschap Kunstliefde in Utrecht and became a board member of the Professional Association of Visual Artists (BBK) in Amsterdam in the late 1960s. In 1969 he took part in 'BBK actions', such as those in which wall newspapers were pasted at the entrance to the Stedelijk Museum. He also acted in the '4 o'clock TV play': No World, Yes World; Government and avant-garde of the fictitious Eastern Bloc country Oritle. He was co-founder of the Kietsjkonservaatooriejum. In 1973 he was co-founder with Bob Bonies of the Union of Visual Arts Workers (BBKA), based in Utrecht. From 1974 to 1989 he was a teacher at the AKI in Enschede. In 1975 he was the initiator of the artist collective Universal Moving Artists, which exhibited in the 'new wing' of the Stedelijk Museum. He later played a leading role in the founding of the Stichting Samenwerking Amsterdamse Kunstenaarsvereniging (SAK). His work, among others, was on display during the Public Works studio exhibitions in Ruigoord. He was interested in Eastern philosophy and Chinese painting and he gave lessons as a Tai chi teacher. He made landscapes and self-portraits, among other things. He worked in various 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 The Captain, 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.