Jasper Hagenaar is a painter based in the southern countryside of the Netherlands. Small in size, Hagenaar’s oil paintings draw their specific atmosphere from his process, which combines loose, fast brushstrokes with precisely placed ones, mostly on panel or paper mounted on panel, though recently sometimes on linen.

The theme of longing is a through-line in Hagenaar’s practice — “a longing for a certain past, a far away place, or an almost forgotten childhood dream.” The subjects that he paints act as metaphors for this feeling. “For instance, the still life paintings refer to the melancholic atmosphere of early 20th century modernism and the recent series of fruit paintings embodies the romantic feeling of escapism,” he explains. “I want every individual painting to be a small universe of its own.”

See more from Jasper Hagenaar below!