Robert Jasper Grootveld
Dutch artist whose happenings sparked the Provo movement.
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via Wikipedia: Robert Jasper Grootveld · see source
Robert Jasper Grootveld (19 July 1932 – 26 February 2009) was a Dutch artist, best known for his events on the Spui in Amsterdam. Grootveld's 'happenings' were a forerunner of the Provo movement, which he later joined.
From 1964 he staged anti-smoking Happenings at the Het Lieverdje (The Little Darling) statue in Amsterdam, after discovering that it had been donated to the city by a tobacco company. Grootveld would appear at midnight on Saturdays, strangely attired, and dance around the statue in a cloud of his own cigarette smoke, as he called all sorts of incantations. At the core of Grootveld's philosophy was the belief that the masses had been brainwashed into becoming a herd of addicted consumers.
Background
Grootveld's Saturday midnight performances at the Het Lieverdje statue drew both Nozems—a Dutch subculture—and intellectuals inspired by his innovative methods of communicating his message. One intellectual, Roel van Duijn, observing the potential of street actions as provocations to alter society, began to distribute a magazine titled Provo at these events. Grootveld's best known incantations were 'Uche, uche, uche' and 'Klaas komt'—the last meaning 'Klaas is Coming!'—which became familiar graffiti around the city. A 1977 photo shows Grootveld’s 'Klaas komt' graffiti still visible in Amsterdam.
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Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Robert Jasper Grootveld (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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