Mrs. Toolip and her Island Collection

Explore the Best New Art Barcelona has to Offer

| BY JAMES ESSEX

“The way in which an artist paints marks their identity.” These are the words of famed Dutch artist Mrs. Toolip, an abstract expressionist painter whose work has recently ventured into the realm of redefining how one creates a masterpiece. Born in New Zealand, raised on the Coast of Brava, and currently living in Barcelona, Mrs. Toolip has experienced much of the natural beauty our world has to offer. She has traveled across continents, lived within differing cultures, and now explores these experiences on her canvas. Her latest series of paintings, appropriately titled, Island Collection, incorporates many of the staples of abstract art while also incorporating her unique use of color and negative space.

Each painting explores a different area of the world the artist has visited while using her memories to create an accurate representation of what she felt while in the moment. This emotional approach to painting is a hallmark of Mrs. Toolip’s work, or as she describes it, “I see art as the way to create something new with my hands to express myself. Emotions, feelings, impressions, and special moments urge me to paint. Such an approach also lends itself to the creative use of tools.

Mrs. Toolip’s Island Collection paintings are a beautiful mix of the successful use of brush, spatulas, and other instruments that work in unison to create works that could be characterized as artistic surgery today. The Island Collection is more than just another abstract work, it is a masterpiece of creative texture design. “I love to work with bare hands,” she explained, “because I like to feel the textures of my work. Touching different materials makes me feel as if I’m connected to my audience and it allows me to fill my pieces with an energy and vibrance that the viewer can see as I bring my paintings to life.”

A good example of this phenomenon comes from Mrs. Toolip’s Dried Lake River, Ethiopia piece. Even when viewing the image online you can feel the coarseness of the sand as the colors reveal the dying soil of a once-fertile lakebed. In contrast, the Island of Palaus a stunning use of vibrant colors to make one feel as if they are looking at the island from the perch of an airplane window.

Moreover, in each work, Mrs. Toolip’s abstract forms of painting prevail over cold archetypal theories of Barcelona’s current abstract expressionist scene. There is a warmth to Mrs. Toolip’s work that strikes a formal balance between the abstract and the practical. Paintings like Tenerife or Brown Lake, Australia, with measurements from 40 x 80 cm to 200 x 100 cm, and prices between $1,400 and $3,500 have been perfectly created for any collector’s home.

When asked about her inspiration for this series, Mrs. Toolip said it was her love of nature and desire to put her emotions onto a canvas that was the driving force behind its creation. “Nature makes me feel unstoppable in my creative world! My technique is very expressive combining acrylics with materials such as stones, sand, lacquer, and many more to achieve an exciting variety of textures and colors. The result of this art experiment is a natural-looking canvas that creates the landscape airview impression. Living and creating in urban Barcelona, I gave some artworks an industrial touch.”

Mrs. Toolip has opened her Barcelona gallery doors to the public to exhibit the Island Collection and it is well worth a visit. Even if you’re too late to view the Island Collection, you should make the Mrs. Toolip Art Gallery a priority stop. Located on C/ Ausias C/ Ausias Marc, 14 the gallery is changing the Barcelona art world in its own right, allowing visitors and guests to view Barcelona’s best and brightest artists free of charge.

If you’d like to learn more about Mrs. Toolip, her Island Collection, or her gallery, you can visit their Instagram page @mrs.toolip to view their current exhibitions or connect with Mrs. Toolip herself. 

Dried Lake River, Etheopia

Green Lake, Austria Artic Iceberg