Hendrik Werkman artwork • painting • previously for sale At the grave of the unknown Dutch soldier (sonnet by Martinus Nijhoff)

As an innovative typographer, the painter and printer Hendrik Werkman from Groningen occupies a special place in Dutch graphic art. He established his printing business in 1909 and came in contact with the artists from Groningen's De Ploeg collective in 1918 when he was asked to print the group's by-laws. He joined them in 1919, printed the first Ploeg catalogue and designed many other publications. His paintings differ from those of the other Ploeg members because he depicted nature based on his imagination as opposed to directly from reality. After 1923, he devoted himself to experimental typographic compositions on paper, which he called 'printed things' and which testify to tremendous originality in his use of traditional printing tools.