Loes

Loesje Hamel
14 x 11 inches, oil on canvas, 2019

Last year I painted both Krzysztof Penderecki and Don Cherry, the two musicians responsible for Actions: Humus, the Exploring Life Force, a work for Free Jazz Orchestra. For the repeat of the work in this year's 100 I looked for someone else to paint and I settled for the vocalist featured on the track who was listed as Loes Macgillycutty. Loes Macgillycutty, it turns out, is Loesje Hamel, a compatriot from the Netherlands, who was a model in the 1950s and died at the age of 35 of cancer. I had never heard of her before but she was connected to score of well known Dutchmen. She was the lover of the famous writer Jan Cremer and (Top 100 alumni) musician Wally Tax. She also collaborated with musicians Ramses Shaffy and Willem Breuker. Breuker's connection landed her in the New Eternal Rhythm Orchestra led by Don Cherry whilst in Europe. A number of Dutch musicians contribute to the composition by the composer Penderecki, besides Hamel and Breuker, Alfred Mangelsdorff, Fred van Hove and Han Bennink can be heard, other famous European jazz musicians on the recording include Peter Brötzmann and Terje Rypdal. There were various images of Loes Hamel available to paint from and I settled on one which sees her smiling. Bad choice; while it's nice to have the person portrayed in a painting look friendly and smile, the all-out bare-your-teeth-smile is another thing altogether, it belongs to the medium of photography, which is instantaneous compared to the delay of painting. A broad smile in a painting eventually becomes an awkward grin. I spend way too many hours to transform the grin and portray someone friendly and cute. I barely succeeded.