Robert Jasper Grootveld
Robert Jasper Grootveld (19 July 1932 – 26 February 2009) was a Dutch artist, best known for his events on the Spui in Amsterdam. Grootveld's 'happenings' were a forerunner of the Provo movement, which he later joined.
Grootveld was born in Amsterdam. From 1964 he staged anti-smoking Happenings at the Het Lieverdje ("The Little Darling") statue in Amsterdam, after discovering that it had been donated to the city by a tobacco company. Grootveld would appear at midnight on Saturdays, strangely attired, and dance around the statue in a cloud of his own cigarette smoke, as he called all sorts of incantations. "Uche, uche, uche" and "Klaas komt" were his best known incantations, the last meaning "Klaas is Coming!" became familiar graffiti around the city. At the core of Grootveld's philosophy was the belief that the masses had been brainwashed into becoming a herd of addicted consumers.[1]
Nozems, a Dutch subculture, were attracted to the street theatre as were some intellectuals inspired by Grootveld's innovative methods of communicating his message. One in particular, Roel van Duijn, observing the potential of street actions as provocations to alter society, began to distribute a magazine called Provo at these events.
References
- ^ History of the Provos High Times, January 1990
- "Magiër van een nieuwe tijd. Het leven van Robert Jasper Grootveld," by Eric Duivenvoorden (Amsterdam, Uitgeverij De Arbeiderspers, 2009)
- "The Provo Riots" by Christopher Gray (London, Heatwave #2, 1966) http://charlieradcliffe.com/wp-content/uploads/Heatwave02.pdf
External links
- Robert Jasper Grootveld obituary in The Independent 20 May 2009
- RJG performances on addiction and the arrival of Klaas and white bicycles Michael Apted(1966)
- Articles with short description
- Short description matches Wikidata
- Use dmy dates from May 2019
- Articles with VIAF identifiers
- Articles with GND identifiers
- Articles with LCCN identifiers
- Articles with RKDartists identifiers
- Articles with BPN identifiers
- Articles with SNAC-ID identifiers
- 1932 births
- 2009 deaths
- Dutch artists
- Dutch activists
- Dutch surrealist artists
- Street theatre
- Anti-smoking activists
- Counterculture of the 1960s