IF YOU VISUALISED MY BEHAVIOUR OVER THE YEARS,
IT WOULD RESEMBLE THE MOVEMENT OF A GROUP OF DANCING
MOSQUITOES OVER A POND IN THE LAST EVENING LIGHT.
… A SPIRALLING BALLET WITH MANY STEPS AND SIDE-STEPS MOVING
FROM TOP TO BOTTOM IN UNPREDICTABLE TWISTS AND TURNS.

THE ‘DANCING MOSQUITOES OVER A POND’ DESCRIPTION NOT ONLY APPLIES THE BEHAVIOUR OF PIETER LAURENS MOL (BREDA, 1946), BUT ALSO TO HIS OEUVRE. EACH WORK IS A SINGLE MOSQUITO, PART OF THE CLOUD. SOLITARY WORKS TELL THEIR OWN STORY, BUT ALSO RESONATE POWERFULLY IN CONNECTION TO OTHER PIECES. THE WEB OF CONNECTIONS BETWEEN THE WORKS REVEALS ITSELF AND YOU FIND YOURSELF SWEPT ALONG IN MOL’S MULTIFACETED,
POETIC AND LAYERED UNIVERSE.

MOL’S OEUVRE IS RICH IN FORMS OF EXPRESSION AND MATERIALS. HIS WORK DRAWS ON VARIETY OF SOURCES – INCLUDING ART HISTORY, MYTHOLOGY, SEMANTICS AND NATURAL SCIENCES. LIKE AN ALCHEMIST, HE ALLOWS NEW CONNECTIONS TO EMERGE, ACROSS TIMES, DISCIPLINES AND FIELDS. THE MULTITUDE OF MATERIALS AND THEIR UNORTHODOX USE IS OFTEN INTERPRETED AS A CONCEPTUAL APPROACH, AS IF THIS WERE AN INTELLECTUALLY AND STRATEGICALLY WELL-CONSIDERED CHOICE. MOL HIMSELF BELIEVES IT’S QUITE THE OPPOSITE, SINCE HIS SPECIFIC APPLICATION OF MATERIALS STEMS FROM A LONGING, A CRAVING, A DESIRE FOR SENSUALITY. A SENSORY EXPERIENCE THAT UNDERLIES HIS FASCINATION WITH THE MATERIAL. MOL EMPLOYS THESE ‘RAW MATERIALS’ – AS HE CALLS THEM – AS A CLARION CALL OR CROWBAR, A PHYSICAL REFERENCE CHALLENGING THE NORMATIVE AND FAMILIAR AND THUS AWAKENING SOMETHING IN THE VIEWER. THE VIEWER PERCEIVES SOMETHING FROM AN UNUSUAL ANGLE AND IS GIVEN ‘FOOD FOR THOUGHT’. TEXT MARJOLEIN VAN DE VEN, FOOD FOR THOUGHT, IN: PIETER LAURENS MOL, NACHTVLUCHT – NIGHT FLIGHT, EXHIBITION CATALOGUE STEDELIJK MUSEUM BREDA, 2022