The circle around Thijs Sterk

Museum Kranenburgh

The museum of modern art in Bergen, housed in an 1882 villa, holding the largest collection of the Bergen School. It includes work by Piet Wiegman, the friend whose influence led Thijs to take up ceramics.

Stedelijk Museum Alkmaar

Alkmaar's city museum, opposite the Grote Kerk, devoted to the art and history of the region. It is the museum closest to Schoorl and Groet, where Thijs worked for most of his life.

KCB — KunstenaarsCentrumBergen

An artists’ society founded in 1947 by, among others, Charley Toorop and Adriaan Roland Holst, with some 180 members. It hosted the retrospective of Thijs Sterk for which Leo Duppen wrote the accompanying text.

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Arti et Amicitiae

One of the oldest artists’ societies in the Netherlands, founded in 1839, with exhibition halls on the Rokin. Here, in 1941, Thijs won four hundred guilders with his city view of the Magere Brug — a small fortune for an artist living on nine guilders a week.

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Jan Louter Kunsthandel

An art dealer devoted entirely to the Bergen School, trading work by Jaap Min, Piet Wiegman and Dirk Breed among others. There is no shop: you call or write for an appointment.

Stichting Jaap Min1914–1987

A fellow student of Thijs at the Rijksacademie; it was through this man from Bergen that he first met the Bergen School, and Min later dropped in regularly at the studio in Schoorl. The foundation, set up in 1989 by his seven children, manages and documents his work.

Piet Wiegman1885–1963

Brother of Matthieu Wiegman and a member of the Bergen School; he settled in 1913 in Groet, the same hamlet where Thijs later found his small polder. Under his influence Thijs took up ceramics in Schoorl, which led to the tile panel in IJmuiden and the decorations for the Zuiderzeemuseum.

John Rädecker1885–1956

The sculptor of the National Monument on Dam Square, who in 1920 built a studio against the dunes at Groet. He belonged to the Bergen avant-garde and asked Adriaan Roland Holst to write the text for his monument.

Dirk Breed1920–2004

A pupil of Thijs who later became known as the painter of the North Holland landscape, born in Kolhorn. His estate runs this site, where a biography by Herman Fijnheer can also be ordered.

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Peter Bes1945

A pupil of Thijs: in the winter of 1964-65 he first entered the studio in Schoorl, and later went on to the Rijksacademie. He etches, draws, photographs and writes poetry, and makes life-size figures of painted cardboard — doves, greyhounds and jazz musicians.

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Dirk Trap1922–1993

Evacuated from Den Helder to Groet during the war, he later settled in Schoorl and was a member of the KCB. He kept company with Frans Meyers, Kees den Tex and Jaap de Carpentier, and died on the beach at Camperduin where he served as a lifeguard.

Cor Hund1915–2008

A fellow student of Thijs at the Rijksacademie, under the same Professor Hendrik Jan Wolter; in 1938 he made a beautiful portrait of Thijs. He became a painter, draughtsman and sculptor, and won the Prix de Rome in 1947.

Adriaan Roland Holst1888–1976

The “prince of Dutch poets” lived from 1918 on the Nesdijk in Bergen and in 1958 set up a fund for artists of the dune region in financial trouble. He co-founded the KCB and wrote the text for John Rädecker’s National Monument; his house is now a writers’ residence.

Chr. J. van Geel1917–1974

Poet and visual artist who from 1946 lived in a studio house on the Achterweg in Groet, until it burned down in 1972. He drew and wrote about the same dune and polder landscape near Groet that Thijs painted.

Anthony van Kampen1911–1991

A travelling writer and journalist, a friend of Thijs, who lived in Bergen from 1946. He wrote about the sea, the Amazon and New Guinea, and became widely known for his Ketelbinkie books.