Willemijn Stokvis (b. 1937) is an art historian and taught history of modern art at the University of Leiden. Her thesis on the Cobra movement gained her the Carel van Mander Prize in 1975. Willemijn Stokvis has many publications on the Cobra movement to her credit, and works as an art critic for the Dutch weekly Vrij Nederland and the art journal Kunstbeeld.
(V + K Publishing bv, 1974, 472 pagina's)
Soon after the end of the Second World War, in 1948, a number of young artists combined forces in the Cobra movement to protest against attempts to restore prewar conditions. Cobra was a passionate ‘Cry of Freedom’ (the title of a painting by Karel Appel). From the outset, these artists were inspired by a longing for simplicity and originality and they searched for ‘first signs’, dug up from the subconscious.
