Tanja Heintjes (1975) is an artist, documentary maker, single mother, drummer and recently had a comeback as a model. She currently lives in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

 

At 7 she discovered the magic of creating images from her mind through photography, with her first camera given by her parents. When her dad told her she couldn’t photograph a shadowed forest with glistening sunbeams that’s what she did and it turned out exactly how she had visualized it. She knew this was what she wanted to do in her life.

As her creativity bloomed she would casually sit her grandpa down, wrap him in her fake leopard coat have him laugh his gold tooth bare like a David Lynch movie in total darkness only to illuminate him with a torch rapidly enlightening him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In her late teens photographing bands and concerts like Iggy Pop, Henry Rollins, Dinosaur Jr and friends and family, she was then accepted at the Royal Academy of Art The Hague, The Netherlands.

 

After being mystically influenced by Suprematism in her teens, where a Malevich painting felt like a blueprint in her brain, she deeply felt all lines forms and colors. Tanja naturally understood the nature of senses, geometrics, art and universal law so this became a defining  moment in her art.

 

[‘Under Suprematism I understand the supremacy of pure feeling in creative art. To the Suprematist the visual phenomena of the objective world are, in themselves, meaningless; the significant thing is feeling, as such, quite apart from the environment in which it is called forth.’ Malevich 1927-]

 

Starting out as a photographer pur sang: falling in love with film, developing, printing and spending hours on end in the darkroom knowing exactly when she took the perfect photo. She then started combining photography and mixed-media realising photography by itself wasn’t enough to make the multi-layered work she envisioned. Scratching, cutting and painting on negatives, slides and prints brought the dimensions she wanted together.

 

Tanja tries to grasp and connect the seemingly different multi-dimensional layers and realities of both daily life and spiritual planes. Where romance and grimness form the most subtle oneness. Using subjects and materials that are both raw and refined, she connects overlooked places in cities like Los Angeles and Amsterdam with an almost celestial elegance, otherworldliness.