"Insane Alcoholic Outsider Art Recovery" I have been a spoiled kid from a good background. Between 8 and 9 I began to drink and tried to get popularity and recognition by other young people by offering them alcohol as well. Finally, I was completely addicted and no longer in control of my life. After a failed marriage, I withdrew more and more from relations and encapsulated. After years on the bottom, I was finally forced by my surroundings into a hospital, to get medical care and I ended up following a withdrawal in Alcoholics Anonymous. Since, everything has changed in my life. I am 54, single and live in a tiny, art-filled apartment on the shores of Lake Michigan, Holland, MI USA. As a former alcoholic, drawing and painting have paved my way, painting has become part of my life: the tension between alcoholism and abstinence brings me forward, which I have accepted this gratefully. My art helped me find my way and I would like to encourage fellow sufferers to trust the help of anonymous Alcoholics too.

My paintings emerge spontaneously, without preliminary sketch, confused, abrupt, direct and unplanned. They emerge from the conflict between life experiences, subconscious impulses and tangled personal aesthetic preferences. This process is exciting, its output open fluctuating between alcohol addiction and sobriety perceived by me as a giftthat I have accepted both in my life. From my works, Individual or as a group results a kind of self-portrait.