Rien Bekkers is one of the most renowned costume designers in the Netherlands and, for forty years, has worked as a costume designer for a.s. ‘Toneelgroep Amsterdam’, the Nederlandse Opera and a large number of foreign productions. Since 1980 is an independent clothing designer for large and small subsidized groups in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany with prominent Dutch directors.
He has worked on more than 150 theatre, ballet, opera performances and film productions.
The most fascinating thing about Bekkers’ design is the tension between the past and the present: it’s always on its way to the new, the unknown and unprecedented, while still being seduced by beauty and enchanted by the imagination. It is inspired by several historical styles that reflects and interprets in its own way guided by the love of craftsmanship. He never just copies. The garment of a particular era serves only as a starting point. Bekkers doesn't think it's dusty to design costumes that often have to look like they were worn hundreds of years ago. On the contrary, he looks for ways to update historical garment.
"My job is to give the actor a feeling that fits his role." “I use beautiful, high-quality fabrics, combined with good panties,” Bekkers continues.
His creativity flourished on the fashion course at the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. There, during an internship at Toneelraad Rotterdam (the precursor to the current Ro Theatre) he discovered his love of costume design. "I am an inventor. I find inspiration everywhere. In a flattened aluminium tube I see a collar.".
After forty years in the profession, Rien Bekkers is far from finished and has shifted his attention to objects of art. “Now I’m making my job my hobby again.” Although he hasn't stopped making theatrical costumes, he now focuses mainly on his costume objects, as he calls his works. This has a big advantage about theatrical locker room: Bekkers isn't restricted by director or actor.. “A singer must be able to hear well. So such an outfit couldn't cover the ears. And with a necklace you have to consider someone's moving larynx. It doesn't bother me anymore.”
Amidst their latest designs: a series of 25 costumes on child-sized mannequins that could theoretically be worn, but are thought of as an object of art.
“Theatre is not a fashion show. There clothes must support an actor. Even the grand and monumental costumes. Now I'm free and all attention can be directed to my designs as an object.”
"From my experience as a costume designer for theatre and opera, I create costume objects." Without an actor, singer or dancer in motion, a costume acquires the characteristics of a monumental sculpture, it becomes an object."
From fantasy, interest in the material and love for craftsmanship, a shape, an atmosphere and a silhouette, which I hope evoke wonder and intrigue, gradually emerge through modeling and experimentation. Different artistic traditions of my own country and other cultures are a source of inspiration. There is no substantive link between the source of inspiration and the final object in which it appears. It's purely about the shape and atmosphere it creates.From relatively simplicity in lines and tones to very lush.
"There's always something sculptured about it, and a little absurd always stimulates my imagination, seeking timelessness."
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