Tijs Dragtsma (1992) - Ropes Hold Her Over Nothing

Two ropes rise out of the top edge of the work and simply stop there, vanishing into the one wall of this cage that was never meant to be climbed. No beam, no ceiling, nothing above the frame to explain what they are tied to. The top edge itself has taken the job, which may be the most practical escape plan in the whole series: do not fight the cell, hang your weight from it instead.

What the surface keeps is a girl mid swing, leaning back, bare feet and skirt thrown forward, turning to look over her shoulder at whoever is watching. A field of fine scratches holds her face, the folds of the headscarf, the long striped tail lifted behind her, and the hands closed tight on the rope, bright enough to stand clear of the dark around them. The skirt loses definition as it falls, the swinging feet thin to almost nothing, and the lower lengths of rope fade until they are more memory than line, as if motion itself were wearing the image thinner the further it gets from her grip.

There is no floor under the swing and no shadow to say how far down it goes. She hangs over nothing, in a black that has no walls to speak of and one edge, directly above her, that is doing all the work. It is the closest thing to flight this series allows: not a girl who has gotten out, but one who has found the single point in the cage strong enough to hold her weight and is riding it anyway.

She looks back at the room she is leaving, the way she always has, except this time there is movement under her, a rope in her hands and nowhere for her feet to land. The pearl earring painting has spent centuries as a fixed point. Here she swings.

Ropes Hold Her Over Nothing belongs to Escape Artists, a series within Art with Scratch by Tijs Dragtsma in which imagery is constructed through controlled surface damage rather than pigment or print, and in which that same damage becomes a way of asking what happens when the only thing holding you up is the very frame you were trying to leave.

No paint. No print. No ink. The image is scratched into the surface of the acrylic glass, present whether or not a light is aimed at it. Light does not create the image. It sharpens it, so the contrast deepens and the piece reads differently from across the room than it does standing in front of it. From a distance she is simply a girl on a swing in the dark. Close up, she is a field of individual marks that only agrees to become a girl again once you step back.

"The rope was always there. She just decided to use it."

About Art with Scratch

Art with Scratch is a body of work in which the image is not drawn, but released. Carved line by line into a deep black surface, each work emerges through countless precise scratches that catch the light and bring form out of darkness.

From a distance, the image appears almost photographic. Powerful, recognisable and full of presence. Yet up close, the work dissolves into a dense field of individual marks. Fine, fragile and almost weightless. What seemed solid reveals itself as a delicate web of lines, each one a deliberate gesture, each one essential to the whole.

Light does not create the image. It sharpens it. The black surface absorbs, while the scratched lines reflect. As light shifts across the surface, the image breathes. From one angle the figure stands clear and defined. From another it softens and settles back toward the darkness from which it came, without ever disappearing. Under a focused spotlight, the contrast deepens and the image takes on a sculptural, almost luminous quality.

What makes this medium so compelling is its quiet tension. The act of scratching is direct and irreversible. Every line is a decision that cannot be undone. Yet the result is not harsh. It is intimate, atmospheric and alive with movement. Hardness becomes softness. Destruction becomes creation. Absence becomes presence.

In works such as this portrait, the figure is never fully fixed. Through the interplay of line, light and shadow, the image shifts with perspective and atmosphere. At certain moments, the subject seems to step forward out of the black. At others, it settles back into stillness. It is within that movement, between sharpness and calm, that the work comes alive.

Like all materials touched by time, the surface carries its own quiet life. Each scratch holds a moment, a breath, a gesture. Together they form not just an image, but a presence, one that continues to reveal itself with every change of light.

About the Artist

My name is Tijs Dragtsma, founder of TD Fine Art Studio.

As an artist, I am driven by a constant desire to explore new visual languages. I do not see art as a fixed style, but as an evolving field of discovery where material, structure, light and emotion come together.

My work often begins with a simple question. How can a material speak in a new way. How can hardness become intimacy. How can precision create emotion. That search lies at the heart of everything I create.

Within TD Fine Art Studio, each body of work is approached as its own world, with its own logic, atmosphere and visual identity. Some works are built through rhythm, repetition and structure. Others emerge through absence, shadow, reflection or tension. What connects them is a shared commitment to originality, clarity and emotional presence.

I am fascinated by contrast. Between strength and fragility. Between control and feeling. Between what is visible and what is left open to interpretation. My goal is not simply to make an image, but to create a work that holds attention, invites reflection and continues to reveal itself over time.

TD Fine Art Studio is the space in which these explorations come together. It is not only a studio, but an evolving artistic universe shaped by curiosity, precision and the ambition to create work that feels distinctive, intentional and alive.

This listing contains AI-generated visualisations. Please refer to the original photographs to assess the actual condition of the object.