Buying, hanging and living with erotic art

Notes from the studio

Buying erotic art and not sure where to start? Honest answers on choosing a painting, where it goes on your wall and what arrives at your door.

59 articleswritten in the studio in Boekel

Where to start

Buying erotic artStart here if you are still deciding. Three articles on what you are buying, what it costs, and how to tell a studio from a print farm. How the work is madeOil on canvas, one painter, several weeks a canvas. What happens between a photograph and a finished painting. Living with the workYou have the painting, or you nearly do. Four articles on which room, how high, what size, and what arrives at your door. The women in Painted IdolsTwenty-four canvases, fifteen named women. The whole series, grouped by subject, with the ones painted more than once together. Prints and editionsThe €35 end of the studio. What a signed edition is, and how it differs from the canvas it came from.

The newest

Living with the workWhy this is a loan and not a rental Living with the workRenting art in the Netherlands: what it costs, and what you give up A single nail left in a bare plaster wall, fresh dust below it, the nail circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words three days, then this, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artWhat happens after you click buy A small stack of uncoated printmaking sheets on an oak table with a graphite pencil across them, the pencil on the stack circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words worth what the signer is worth, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artWhat a certificate of authenticity is, and what it is not Five stretched canvases of different sizes standing in a row, all turned face to the wall, the largest canvas in the row circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words this is the whole studio, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artAffordable original erotic art A bright apartment living room with a slate blue sideboard and a dusty pink chair, the empty wall circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words two questions, not one, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artChoosing erotic art together with your partner A flat cardboard shipping box leaning against a wall, still taped shut, the flat shipping box circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words can they hang it, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artErotic art as a gift: how not to get it wrong A living room with a dark honed stone wall along its length and a stone grey sofa, the empty stone wall circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words nobody knows, including me, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artDoes erotic art hold its value? A closed notebook with a pen across it on a studio table, a canvas standing edge-on behind, the closed notebook circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words a judgement, not a sum, by Willem van der Krieken Buying erotic artWhat an original erotic oil painting costs, and why A wooden palette with skin tones at one side and a pool of blue-black at the other, a fine liner brush across it, the pool of blue-black circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words the ink is the subject, by Willem van der Krieken The women in Painted IdolsTattooed and inked: the canvases where the ink is the subject Five stretched canvases of different sizes standing in a row, all turned face to the wall, where two of the canvases overlap circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words the words overlap, they do not, by Willem van der Krieken The women in Painted IdolsAlt, inked, pin-up: what the words mean A mobile phone lying face down on a paint-stained studio table, the phone lying face down circled in open black marker, an arrow from the handwritten words she stopped me mid-scroll, by Willem van der Krieken The women in Painted IdolsWhy these women, and not a life model

What is holding you up?

  1. I can't tell whether this is art or pornography.
  2. I want to buy one, but everything I find online looks mass-produced.
  3. I'm not sure I'm the kind of person who buys something like this.
  4. I don't dare hang it where visitors can see it.
  5. I don't know how high to hang it, or what belongs next to it.
  6. I don't know whether it will fit above the bed.
  7. I don't want the delivery driver to see what I bought.
  8. I recognise the woman in the painting and want to know how she ended up on a canvas.
  9. I don't know what I actually get for 35 euro.
  10. I want to know whether one person really paints all of these by hand.

Paint Your Idol

Break one open yourself.

The painting of the day sits behind a wall of stone, and you break it open a cube at a time. Everyone who plays gets 20% off any painting, and every canvas you play builds up credit for the shop.

Play

Level 1 is free practice