RaQuel van Haver wins De Scheffer 2017 Award

Amsterdam artist RaQuel van Haver has won De Scheffer Award 2017. It is a biennial encouragement award for young fine artists instigated by the Dordrechts Museum Association. The prize consists of the purchase of a work and an exhibition in the Dordrechts Museum. RaQuel van Haver’s dark, raw and energetic works can be admired as of 31 October 2017. Alongside to the solo exhibition of her works, the Dordrechts Museum opens an overview exhibition with works by previous winners of De Scheffer Award.

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RaQuel van Haver (1989, Bogota, Colombia) graduated from HKU Utrecht, Fine Arts in 2012. She was nominated for the Dutch Royal Award for Modern Painting in 2012, 2013 and 2016. She has exhibited her works both in the Netherlands and abroad many times. Haver’s paintings offer snapshots of daily life in Amsterdam’s South-East district and similar places where the artist worked previously. Her paintings are often monumental.

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The contest entries were judged by a jury consisting of: Maria Schnyder, curator De Pont Museum Tilburg, Gerrit Willems, curator modern and contemporary art Dordrechts Museum, Ton Kraayeveld, visual artist and Ada van de Vijver - Hobijn, visual artist.

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The jury was struck by the authenticity and the mature attitude of the only 28-year-old artist and motivates its choice as follows: “In everything RaQuel van Haver's work is a response to the outside world. The world she finds herself in and with which she feels connected as a person. Huge constructed canvases, reliefs heavy with tar and rope and paint, with large figures emerging from the paint. Prostitutes in the watering holes in Zimbabwe, street youth in Lagos, types in Amsterdam Bijlmer where she has her studio. The small works are also reliefs, with convincing portraits of street models. She is seeking out the danger, works on location. Knows how to convey her world and her involvement in an asserting way.”​