Van der Vaart’s photography seems to articulate an inner conflict between a passion for science and a suppressed feeling for spirituality. This duality has trickled down into her work. Throughout her oeuvre, van der Vaart developed form and method to keep up with the requirements of her themes. Science, time, cosmos and spirituality have been translated in star-spangled nudes, esoteric black and white landscapes, and timeless caves. She has a fascination for analogue techniques such as silver gelatine prints, cyanotype, silkscreen printing and photopolymer etching. In these techniques the focus is on the process and with them, she wants to bring the photograph back to the physical and material world. [Official Website]

“There is no finality, no purpose, in this endless dance of atoms.

We, just like the rest of the natural world,
are one of the many products of this infinite dance.
The product of an accidental combination.
Nature continues to experiment with forms and structures;
and we, like the animals, are the products of a selection which is random and accidental, over the course of eons of time.
Our life is a combination of atoms,
our thoughts are made up of thin atoms,
our dreams are the products of atoms,
our hopes and our emotions are written in a language formed by combinations of atoms, the light which we see is comprised of atoms which bring us images.

The seas are made of atoms, as are our cities,
and the stars.”

Carlo Rovelli “Reality is not what it seems”