“…At the beach the fatties tend to crawl away and that is a pity; especially when I want to paint them.”

Says Pierre Guillaume, pseudonym for Peter Willemse [born 1954] , nick-named “le Boucher-Boudin” and for
good reason since this gentle and self-taught artist has the shape of a sturdy butcher and the talent of Eugene Boudin,
the famous French painter of harbors and beaches.

“… I have been busy drawing ever since I was a little boy”, remembers the artist now age 50, “
and that urge never left me. It is still a must.”

Born and bred in Leiden, he settles in that city as a professional artist in 1975.

Although his talent is immediately recognizable, it is not easy to make a living with his figurative and realistic paintings in a country where abstract art is “a la mode”.

But he never changed his style for commercial reasons: “… I have always done what I like and that I will do until the end of my life. The last couple of years I work more often outside in the open air. Under these circumstances I work in an impressionistic style different from the realistic work I make in my studio. I use the pseudonym “Pierre Guillaume” for my beach-paintings which I intend to paint in every corner of the world.”

The artist created his beach-paintings in Portugal and in Holland and intends to visualize the beaches of Bali in April,
with a visit to South-America planned for the winter.

At a closer look, Pierre Guillaume’s outside paintings are more than just impressions.

Apart from beach, sea and clouds at different moments of the day, the artist visualizes beach-life  in a mixture of anecdotes and situations. It looks as if he has surprised his models, showing them with his mild humor without becoming blunt or illustrative. With works entitled “The little voyeur”, “Pensive oldies” and “Mobile phoning. And spying?” Tthe artist of today discerns himself from the Impressionists of the past.

And a great future might lie ahead:
In Foz de Arelho, a village on the beach of Portugal, he is asked to paint a Panorama, comparable in size to the
Panorama Mesdag in The Hague [ 14 meters high and 120 meters in circumference].

“…I look forward to that project without fear of its large size. A couple of years ago I was asked to make a painting for the
Theatre Hall in Leiden, a canvas of 3 by 5 meters. Until today I receive enthusiastic fan-mail; people like it a lot. And when
the project in Portugal is finished, we have been contacted by people in Marbella in Spain and, who knows one day a
Panorama in Asia?”

After a short silence the artist laughs: “..Doing nothing I can not, painting I can and I must…..”