Like an Echo from the Past Noorderlicht Safe Haven Korrie Besems Photography

Safe Haven

Man and nature form a harmonious dyad. The landscape is open and safe, in part designed by man, who in turn seeks rest and recreation there. This is landscape as a museum, a playground, and a canvas on which we paint the intimate stories of our lives.

Korrie Besems

A Contrived Past

The current urban landscape in the Netherlands is more and more derived from neo-traditional architecture: complete suburbs are built in this style. The houses appear old but gleam with newness. Project developers do not sell individual houses but 'images' that look familiar and safe. Colourful artist's impressions on billboards with appealing slogans win still hesitant buyers over. Many picturesque examples from the history of Dutch architecture are nonchalantly copied and some locations could be mistaken for Disneyland. Examples from other countries are also popular; colonial houses from the southern United States and the 'Medieval' Tuscany village are most in demand.

Korrie Besems documents this new urban landscape in her photographs. The guiding principle is the need to show the artificial and unnatural transformation process of the densely populated Netherlands. Our country has been self-made already for centuries by land reclamation, the struggle against water, a close-knit infrastructure and good housing. The Netherlands is designed in every detail to every farthest corner of the land but even so, partly due to international pressure, it constantly soon gets turned upside down again. Subsequently the 'shelf life' of landscapes and residential areas seems to be becoming shorter and shorter. The question arises of what this means for the general historical consciousness as well as the cultural value and meaning of earlier developments in architecture and urban planning.

Besems's sharply-focused photographs betray an ambiguous attitude of disgust and admiration and with that acquire multiple meanings. Besems tries to unravel the resistance to the neo-traditionalism and place it in perspective.

Bernard Hulsman has written an essay for this publication in which he investigates why neo-traditionalism has been able to grow into such a widespread phenomenon in the Netherlands; the land of an unbroken modernist tradition in architecture. See for a review ...

Open publication - Free publishing - More architecture

Open publication - Free publishing - More art

Spend your holiday at a superb location in the old harbour of a small rural city Stavoren at the shores of the IJsselmeer Lake with bicycle routes, courses of navigation and footpaths to a magnificent wooded area and lakes nearby. All this is just a short distance from a delightful harbour house in the 't Hanzekwartier in Stavoren, with its friendly outdoor cafés, restaurants and hotels, and the oldest city that is part of the famous Friesland eleven-city skating marathon. 

In the year 2000, the Hanzekwartier was named after the historical and glorious period of the trade union, when merchant ships sailed the seas with their valuable cargo. Today, the old harbour is a fishing port, visited by the brown 'charter' fleet and pleasure yachts from home and abroad. A blend of languages is heard in the harbour and pubs, like an echo from the past. 

From the sun lounge on the first floor, enjoy the maritime hubbub in the six-person harbour house reminiscent of the warehouses from the olden days. The south-facing balcony has a view of the IJsselmeer Lake, the Hanzekwartier and ancient Stavoren. Two doors on the ground floor provide access to the house: one of them to the built-in storeroom and one to the hall, bathroom, lavatory and a double bedroom. The second floor has two spacious double bedrooms and a bathroom with a bath and lavatory.

A house you will certainly love!

• Fully furnished and extremely comfortable with a private parking space around the corner.
• With museums, places of interest and picturesque towns such as Hindelopen and Workum nearby.
• Options for sailing in a historic three-master or a round-trip to Enkhuizen with the ferry.