Trauma Art Archive

350 Works on Institutional Betrayal and Survival

For seventeen years, I was a child of the Dutch youth care system  of which almost fourteen  years in foster care (out of home care). Those years left me with deep physical and complex psychological scars and a life positioned outside the boundaries of mainstream society.  When the  mental health care system (Dutch GGZ) failed to provide access to the help I needed, art became my only path to survival. Formal apologies were issued by the state in 2019, yet for survivors, the reality remains unchanged. Access to the mental health care required to process decades of institutional trauma is still non-existent in 2026.

Why 350 Works?

This collection of approximately 350 artworks is a direct response to silence and exclusion. When you are ignored by the systems meant to protect you, your voice must find another way to exist. My work of trauma art explores:

• The Void of Identity: Navigating life after foster care and the loss of parents, family and home.
• Institutional Betrayal: Speaking out against the invisible (physical) violence  and long-term social isolation, destruction of gender, identity and origin
• Infant bonding and horizontal (toddler) group bonding methods  during forced detachment of the mother in state institutions in the 50-60's provide complex consequences, where institutions and the state use gaslighting of victims,  blaming them for their changed feelings 
• A response  to post- war Antisemitic/ Nazi rhetoric and methods used in the Netherlands by police officers in a police station  against 'marginalized, voiceless minorities  without representation and advocacy in society', ignored by Amnesty International-  8 pieces of intrusive memories are added in achive#3 (Dutch Police of Zwolle January 1986) .  The period around 1986 was one of the most violent in post-war history of the police and violated basic human rights (EHCR art 3)
• The void of Silence: I publish this archive to confront the society that prefers "clean" trauma stories. My work is raw, uncomfortable, and honest because the violence I endured in social isolation was exactly that. Although I realize exposing trauma art on the internet is a very vulnerable thing, it's the only way to show institutional betrayal and destruction of innocent lives by state control. The sheer volume of this archive reflects the inescapable repetition of the abuse; it is not a single story, but a landscape of systematic failure

Pathalogization of trauma response 

My work is a visual protest against the pathologization of my survival. For seventeen years, the Dutch youth care system forcibly dismantled my childhood- including my boyhood and gender of birth-  leaving me with lasting fractures that the medical world now tries to label as a 'disorder.' I reject this labels. What they call a sickness, I call the inevitable result of a deliberate institutional destruction.

The public prosecutor as eraser of stories 

When the Public Prosecutor’s Office (OM) dismissed my case in 1996—despite physical injuries and witness testimonies—they did more than stop a trial; they functioned as a bureaucratic eraser. By refusing to prosecute, the state effectively "deleted" the victim’s history from official reality, obstructing my path to liberation.  This institutional contempt  was further personified in 1995 by the Golden Medal of Honor in the Order of Orange-Nassau, awarded to the foster mother that severely abused three foster children over many years, which was known by the official custody organizations and the Child Protection Council. While the state decorated the perpetrator for "merit," it rendered the victim’s trauma invisible. The archive is a counter - voice against the Public Prosecutor's policy. 

Art as a Necessity, Not a Luxury

I have no formal background in art. My paintings and drawings are not meant to be "polished" or "calibrated." They are raw, intrusive images processed on paper and canvas since 1992. This work is grounded in documented reality: my experiences of extreme institutional violence and neglect have been officially recognized by the Dutch State ("Schadefonds Geweldsmisdrijven") as the most severe forms of abuse and acknowledged by Youth Care Netherlands and the Child Protection Council. This collection of 300 works is the visual testimony of a history that the State has acknowledged in private, but often remains invisible in public.

Author under pseudonym

To protect my family's privacy I wrote two autobiographical books and many articles on Reporters Online under the pseudonym of Jasper Heijting about the circumstances of my childhood. Since 2025 it is no longer necessary to remain under the pseudonym and it's now linked to my art website. 

From 2020 to 2023, I was a member of the collective studio Fantastike in Maastricht. During this period, I authored this article  about the members of the collective studio,  exploring the vital role of art as a tool for processing trauma—viewing creative practice as an essential means of soul expression, communication, and a way to reclaim participation in the world. 

For those seeking a more detailed account of my history in the youth care system and foster care,   I documented my experiences in the book "Gepleegd" (published in 2022 under the pseudonym Jasper Heijting at Tobi Vroegh, Amsterdam,  and  to be published in English autumn 2026)