Amsterdam-based Else Madelon Hooykaas (b. 1942) is an internationally acclaimed photographer, video artist, and filmmaker. As one of the first generation of artists to adopt video as a medium, she is recognized as a transformative figure in video art, reshaping the boundaries of contemporary art through her pioneering approach. Hooykaas is widely known for her collaboration with Scottish artist Elsa Stansfield, as part of the duo Hooykaas/Stansfield. Together, they have produced a wealth of groundbreaking video environments and installations, exhibited internationally. Beyond her collaborative work, Hooykaas has established herself as a visionary solo artist, with a remarkable and ever-expanding legacy across photography, film, interactive performance, and conceptual installations.
Madelon Hooykaas, originally from Rotterdam, the Netherlands, began her photography studies under various Dutch photographers before moving to Paris in 1964. In 1966, she was awarded the Europhot Prize to work in England on her photo project Along the Pilgrim’s Way to Canterbury, inspired by The Canterbury Tales. Afterward, Hooykaas worked in Brussels and Paris, before establishing herself as a freelance photographer and filmmaker. In 1968, she was awarded a travel scholarship as the first Dutch photographer to the United States by the Netherlands Ministry of the Arts. During her time in New York, she worked alongside photography legends Philip Halsman and Bert Stern, also taking lessons from Garry Winogrand and Joel Meyerowitz. Upon her return to the Netherlands, she joined the professional association of photographers GKf and began writing about photographers she admired for the influential Dutch magazine Foto, including profiles on figures such as Robert Doisneau and Jacques Henri Lartigue, as well as several Japanese photographers. She has also travelled to Japan multiple times, where she interviewed photographers while simultaneously deepening her interest in Zen Buddhism.
In her practice, Madelon Hooykaas explores profound themes of time, space, memory, and abstraction, inviting audiences into immersive and meditative experiences. Her artistic practice is also deeply influenced by her lifelong commitment to Zen Buddhism, which she embraced after a impactful meeting with philosopher Alan Watts in California. This influence is evident in her installations, where she seamlessly integrates themes of nature and spirituality.
While Hooykaas’ conceptual work in photography, performance, and video environments have been shown widely, her early photographic work remains largely unexplored publicly. These vintage photographs—printed by the artist herself—offer a truly unique opportunity to glimpse the genesis of Madelon Hooykaas’ artistic journey. These works, dating back to 1959 when she was just 17 years old, are a remarkable documentation of Dutch everyday life throughout the 60s and 70s. They capture scenes from Rotterdam’s harbor—a place frequently visited by the artist in her childhood and a source of great inspiration for her photography—as well as images depicting war-torn Rotterdam after the Second World War, urban life in Amsterdam and every day moments at the beach in Scheveningen.
Hooykaas’ work is part of numerous esteemed museum and private collections, including the Amsterdam Medical Center, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Centraal Museum Utrecht, Museum Arnhem, Museum Gouda, the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands and Bonnefanten Museum Maastricht. Internationally, her work has been exhibited and held in prestigious institutions such as Tate Britain, The Photographers’ Gallery, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Zentrum für Kunst und Medien (ZKM), MuHKA Museum for Contemporary Art in Antwerp, the Gallery of Modern Art Glasgow (GoMA), as well as collections in Canada, Switzerland, and Australia.
