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“Amongst those who have brought drawings and paintings from the
Dutch East Indies
, G.P. Adolfs stands out on account of the striking frankness of his style. These are not the aperçus of a typical Dutch painter seeking to achieve atmosphere and tone at all costs; but neither is there any forced exoticism in the style. He knows how to inform us directly and spontaneously of the atmosphere of a particular location – both in his paintings and in his sketches and water-colours. He tells us about the special mixture of the intimate and the fantastic in an old quarter of Surabaya and about the phantasmagorical might of a tall temple gate topped with a monstrous idol; he tells us about the epic quality of the lakes with proa boats sailing on them; and about the graceful indolence of local people leaning against broken walls. He has the unpretentiousness of true inspiration, and some of his compositions – the one with the temple gates and the one with the well – convey a strong and strange enchantment to the observer.”
(De Telegraaf, Amsterdam, 2 June 1929)
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“Many
are called, but few are chosen!” One
of those few is Ger. P. Adolfs, whose income as a painter allows him to
travel to Europe,
Japan
and
China
for instance.”
(Java Bode, Batavia, 30 November 1936)
“His paintings are among the best we have seen for expressing the spirit, the colour and the vivid sunshine of this part of the world.”
(The
Malayan Tribune, 28 Jan. 1938)
“He
does not shy away from any subject. Whether it is ‘5th Avenue, New
York’, or ‘a San Francisco street scene’, or ‘a minor view in
Cairo’, or the ‘statue of the poet Chamois in Lisbon’, or ‘a
market for women slaves in China’, he can be relied upon to capture it
in his own inimitable fashion: colourful, animated and improvised.”
(The
Java
Bode, 21 December 1939)
“Mr. Adolfs has travelled round the world, and everywhere he went he recorded his observations in the manner of a travelling reporter – but in coloured pen and pencil drawings instead of with colourful words. And since he can capture any image quite quickly and is an experienced draughtsman, he has successfully depicted practically every subject that struck him as interesting or picturesque. The artistic harvest he has brought to the
Dutch East Indies
is indeed a rich one.”
(Ochtend
Post, Batavia, 28 Dec. 1939)
“…what rich colours! And those little warong scenes, that cockfight, thosedancers….They are all real.And so are the colours. It all goes straight to theheart of the matter. It’s all been captured on the canvas with talent and feeling.This is the vision of an artist who has travelled across the Orient for twentyyears, seeking to fathom the soul, the inner being of his living themes.He has fathomed them.”
(De
Telegraaf, 13 July 1940)
"In his works
he has always attempted to represent the light, colour and the simple joy
of life that impregnates the native scenes of the East. As can be seen
from the works reproduced, he has a bold, vigorous style, applying his
pigments with quick strokes of the palette knife."
(The
Studio, London, October 1950)
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