CHRONOLOGICAL BIO: THE ART OF SURVIVAL

1978 – 1991: The Erasure
In 1978 I tried to escape foster care but failed because I had no contact in the outside world.  In 1979, after the most dark period of my time in the foster family I escaped foster care, but  spent the following years homeless, living in the woods and on the streets. During this time, the youth care system deliberately left me in total social isolation while they withheld medical and psychological care from me.  In 1981, I officially left the system—discarded without qualifications, carrying the permanent injury of a brutal upbringing. I felt like a creature from another planet. Only six years into this survival, in 1986, extreme police violence shattered what little remained of my spirit. After surviving multiple suicide attempts, I was admitted to a psychiatric ward in 1989, only to be discharged with the chilling words: "In your case, we believe suicide is the best option for you."

1992 – 2003: The Bulger Trigger
My artistic journey began in 1992, initially painting model airplanes and toys in acrylics. I soon moved to oils and pastels, focusing on portraits of infants and toddlers. But in February 1993, the world collapsed. The murder of toddler James Bulger by two ten-year-old boys acted as a violent trigger and split my mind, mirroring an unsolvable imbalance in the order of childhood that had long defined my own past.  I spiraled into years of relentless flashbacks, producing hundreds of "unfinished memories" and intrusive images on canvas. In 2002, during a move to the south of the Netherlands, I destroyed almost the entire collection in an act of purging; only about 50 photographs of those works remain.

2004 – 2018: Fragmentation and Inquiry
By 2004, I turned to nature art and weaving, eventually creating a self-portrait in pastel to manifest a seven-year-old self named Jimmy who took over my life.  Over the next decade, through twelve different homes, the creative drive never ceased. I crafted authentic prehistoric tools, experimented with 3D objects, and explored 4D laser projections while studying quantum mechanics—concepts that would eventually converge in my work,  like in the  work  “Entanglements.” that I made in 2024. 

2019 – Present: The Victory of the Image
In 2019, I sought to bring structure to the chaos. Returning to portraits of toddlers and young boys, my art became a raw form of inner communication—a dialogue between my fragmented psyche and the awaiting canvas. My inner world spilled out in hundreds of works, many of which I destroyed when they became too agonizing to behold. As I pushed the boundaries of my imagination, my co-identities, Tim and Alex, began to claim the pen themselves. To me, that meant so much: I was no longer alone in my creative process and could share my inner world—and they theirs. From 2020 to 2023, I joined the Fantastike studio in Maastricht, marking my first public exhibitions. Having been denied meaningful mental health care for most of my life—receiving only hollow labels instead of healing—art became my sole anchor.

Every mark I make today is a victory over a system that tried to permanently erase all aspects of my existence. I still carry the memory of being eight years old, watching my pencil drawing of a squirrel being torn to shreds by those who shouted, "All art on earth must be destroyed!" My work is the living proof that they failed. Their lies are gone; the art remains.