MV attended the Free Academy of the Hague between 1970 and 1975.   She became a pupil of Wil Bouthorn (born 1916), with whom she was  to share her life until his death in 2004. MV enjoyed the freedom which  the Academy afforded her to develop her own approach to painting and  other forms of art, in a non-directive environment. All things were  possible. Nevertheless,MV was later to become convinced that a  painter should inderstand his “trade”, appreciating different techniques,  understanding the different media and how their use has developed  over time. These are values which she brings to her teaching of both  children and adults, a part-time activity  which she finds a source of  inspiration and joy. 

MV’s preferred media for her own work are oil on canvas and gouache  on paper. She prefers media  which are full of life and radiate their own  language By contrast with the freedom which she experiences in  painting with oils, she  has also developed a liking for woodcuts, printed  in colour, which require the artist to adhere to a rigid set of rules,  including a clearer separation between colour and form.  However,  consistent with her free spirit, she delights in the occasional “creative  disaster” to which such a formal technique is prone.  MV’s major works are in oil. Her oil paintings have, from conception, a  clear subject, but the metamorphosis which occurs from the  subject  to  the  finished work is a long process, in which the subject becomes  submerged/concealed under the colours of the paint. The outline  disappears, and yet the subject remains intact. MV may devote many  months, sometimes even years, on one or sometimes on a connected  group of paintings, building layer upon layer of colour. The first layers  are not obliterated, but continue to form part of the narrative, rather like  the strata that make up an ancient Tel, which reveal its history and forms  an integral part of its story.  For MV,colours in particular contain the feelings she experiences,  expressing her emotions in the painting. The transformative power of art  is something which she experienced like an electric shock when, at the  age of 16, she first read Franz Kafka’s “Verdict”. This transformative  power includes the ability of art to transform ugliness to beauty, to  convert the unbearable into the bearable,  to convert  the transitory to  something lasting.   MV describes her creative process as involving a progression from the  opaque to the translucent- like being in an aquarium full of murky water  which slowly clears. It is a process which demands patience. The  conclusion can never be forced. The artist must follow the path around  the painting, seeking that one moment of clarity.  MV’s  work falls within the Western tradition of art, without in any way  being tied to its classical traditions. She has a unique style, expressive,  with strong  emotional content. Her prize-winning portrait of IK, the  Nobel prize winner, epitomises some of her outstanding qualities – the  attention to detail, contrasted with the daring use of emptiness-  but  more than anything the layer upon layer of paint which gives the portrait  both physical and psychological  depth.  William Duncan The Hague August 2014