- Tao van Toonder -
In this book Marten Toonders world of thought is given shape. It is seen as the moving force behind his artistic statements: writing, drawing, poetry and film. Mind, after all, creates matter. 'Mens agitat molem'1.
The artist is a man connected to his environment. Therefore the quintity of his artistry is worked out in five broader contexts: Thinker, Man, Irishman and Dutchman, Writer and Drawing Artist, Filmer. In the compartments 'writer' and 'filmer' the drawing artist becomes visible too. The filmer appears on the DVD. And films, one does not talk about, one shows them.
Mind and matter are key notions in Marten Toonder's world of thought. They do not just refer to life as a phenomenon, but also to man as an individual. Therewith, these concepts can be traced back to alchemy's famous pentagram. This is what life's secret is about: quinta essentia, the unnamable fifth element. As it is in this book; that is the quintessence.
Marten Toonder's world of thought can impossibly be described in detail. What's large and extensive can only be viewed as a whole through a lookinglass. Therefore the book is made up of text fragments, that each shed light on a characteristic facet of his world of thought. From the whole of the fragments, the contours of a world of thought appear.
The text fragments are taken from the more than one hundred and fifty hours of remaining video and audio-recordings of interviews with Marten Toonder, from the period between 1963 and 2004. The most typical quotes from them have subsequently been turned into written language. Then, these were mulled over, in many a session, with Marten Toonder, and honed to perfection.
This working method leads to a personal and representative rendition of a world of thought. After all, the interviewed corrects the style and content of the dialogue with hisself. The composer therewith does not degenerate into a biographer, who from his own point of view relates about the main character of the biography; the composer merely guides the process, and chisels.
1Virgil. Aeneis 6, 727
The book can be obtained from Panda Publishers.
