Self-portrait as a tennis hero, an image that — as my coach would acknowledge — wouldn’t be far from the truth if I would have begun playing earlier in my life. Sadly, I did not, for reasons not quite clear to me; because no-one really pushed me, because the ironic time and place I grew up in were unfriendly to my ambitions, because I was too sensitive and intelligent to lose my mind in the game, because I was always too busy imagining what I could become to actually become something else than a man who has turned his fantasies into who he really, and professionally, is. Whatever happened, my boyish wishes still linger on in my not so private fantasies, and as far as I know they still offer me a sensible, adult way to become whatever I want, in my studio, for example, using the props available, such as the dirty mattress I never sleep on. (2012) Courtesy Tim Van Laere Gallery

Rinus Van de Velde