Keetje Mans’ (b. Amsterdam, 1979) paintings are often rooted in humor and the absurdity of everyday situations, often bordering on the grotesque. A sense of cultural ‘rubbing along’ runs like a thread through her paintings and drawings, represented in characteristic scenes with mystical dimensions and references to exotic folk culture, which lend distinctive symbolic overtones to the work. Mans has developed a characteristic iconography of elements that return in many of her works, such as flowers, bars, decorative wallpaper, hardwood floors, candles and (the hands of) smoking ladies.  By using off-colors and domestic elements she displaces her subjects and motives out of their contexts in vaguely home-made interiors, in an open field, next to a barn, or on top of a bar. By carefully contrasting brush strokes, shapes and colors, Mans is looking for the sweet spot in her work where the light and dark meet and challenge each other – both visually and intrinsically.