Born in the Netherlands in 1928, I decided early in life to gofor the priesthood in religious life. My religious superiors proposed
that I should finish my studies in Canada and prepare for a teaching career there.I gradually branched off into art teaching,
and in 1964 I graduated from the OntarioCollege of Art as an Art Specialist.In l966 I was accepted by CUSO to teach
painting in a leading Collegiate in Uganda.Immersion in this
African milieu changed my Western way of evaluating and creatively recording
life.It taught me to be open to other
cultures and not simply stampede in with preconceived Western ideas.
The school was located near the equator in a rainforest
belt on the shore of Lake
Victoria.As a result, another hobby of mine,
collecting butterflies, blossomed into a major absorption of interest.
Collecting insects day after day, season after season, enabled me to send and
sell thousands of butterflies and beetles to collectors all over the Western
world, and to enlarge the collection of the Entomology Research Institute at the
Central Experimental Farm in Ottawa, Canada with over 25.000 insects.
I became an expert in this field and discovered seven new species,namely six flies and one long-horned beetle.
Chaos and bloodshed
under dictator Idi Amin forced me in 1974 to return to Canada and to settle in a similar position of
artist-teacher-pastor in the Ottawa area.While
teaching fulltime for the next 15 years, the growing shortage of priests
compelled me to take on parishes as well.In the meantime, a growing passion for sculpture, especially to capture
the humanness in biblical stories, has kept me creative even in my late
seventies, and even though I am still taking care of two rural parishes.Art, especially sculpture, has become my best
lasting tool to make religion more intelligible for literally thousands in
schools, churches, and homes.
