Vonhof’s work confronts the concept of internal and external freedom through use of color, brushwork, and compositional layers, using landscape as a guide for expression. His focus has been to achieve freedom in expression and the process of making art, unburdened by the formalities of composition and realism. 

The landscape seemed the natural place to turn for this expression. For Vonhof, it is the epitome of freedom. However, through his studies he has learned that the landscape in art is never truly free, as many of the modern landscapes we enjoy and admire are forever tainted due to colonial policies. The landscape is a representation of ownership and control, whether over nature itself or the human beings that have occupied that space through time. Freedom does not exist in the modern landscape. 

Landscape Series I consists of six imagined landscapes. This bypasses the implied ownership of the landscape, as well as the bounds of realism, and allows for the freedom of creation and expression that the artist has been seeking. All the paintings are inspired by the many beautiful areas that he has seen in his life, but are not paintings of any specific location. Vonhof attempted to capture the subtle variations in color that exist in forms and structures that we see as solid by painting in many layers and using brushwork that allows the hidden colors to show through, just as they do in nature.

Featured in INTRO. Issue 1