Jan Mulder grew up in Maastricht but moved to Amsterdam in 1906, where he studied to become an artist. After the First World War, he worked as a stage designer and commercial artist. In 1922, after a trip to Cuba, Mexico and the USA, he made his debut as a painter. He was influenced by the avant-garde scene in Amsterdam, where he met Erich Wichmann, Piet Mondriaan and Theo van Doesburg. Mulder lived in France between 1925 and 1931. After returning to Amsterdam, he became the chairman of the painters’ association De Brug and showed his works in their annual group exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum. In the late 1940s, after receiving grants from the Dutch-Swedish van Gogh Committee, he moved permanently to Sweden. He began mainly as a portrait painter but his art gradually took another direction. Mulder’s imagery is characterised by formal simplicity, giving his watercolour compositions a poetic, suggestive nature. He masters the empty space and allows his airy figures to float freely, overlapping and pursuing their journey across the pictorial surface in sombre, earthy hues.

Jan Mulder

More works by the artist