Jits Bakker Biography
Jits Bakker (1937 - 2014) was a Dutch visual artist, sculptor, painter, watercolourist, draftsman, glass artist, silversmith, ceramist and graphic designer. Bakker's youth in Renkum was overshadowed by World War II. After the Battle of Arnhem in September 1944, Bakker was evacuated to Friesland. After the war, the Bakker family lived in poverty, which is why young Bakker was transferred to Sweden for a year. From 1950 to 1953 he followed three years of training at the professional school where he obtained a diploma as a painter-decorator. He worked as a floor upholsterer and wallpaper designer and studied in the evenings at the Arnhem Academy of Art. In 1959 Bakker graduated from the graphic school in Utrecht and held his first exhibition of watercolors and portraits in Renkum and De Reehorst in Ede. Bakker has therefore worked for more than 50 years as an independent and versatile artist. Bronze and marble sculpture was his great passion, but he was also active as a painter, glass artist, graphic designer and jewelery maker. Assignments at home and abroad have allowed him to achieve international fame with his art. Expressive movement and exuberance are characteristic of his work, but he also made "silent" and intimate images. Sources of inspiration included classical mythology, music, dance and sport. Since 1999, more than 30 of his monumental sculptures have been exhibited outdoors on the Beerschoten estate in De Bilt, which he donated to the province of Utrecht in 2009. This Sculpture Park Jits Bakker is freely accessible every day from dawn to dusk.
