In her art Lisette searches for the hidden stories in our landscape. Her work is about how men and nature each play their part in creating this landscape. In ‘De Bollenstreek’ the influence of men is distinctly visible. She tends to look for places, that are untouched by men. In this region you may find these in unexpected spots. Did you know, for instance, that ‘De Veenenburgerlaan’ and the railway are not on man-made dikes? They are on the old dunes. The rest of the terrain is leveled to make stones for the build of Amsterdam. Later they became bulb fields. The same applies to the ‘Maartenskerk’ and ‘Molenduintje’ in Hillegom.

If you want to know how our landscape looked like before the old dunes were leveled, you have to go to the ‘Keukenhofbos’ or the dunes. And if you think those dunes are pure untouched nature? Then you are wrong. For ages people have lived, worked and farmed here. If you look closely you may discover the contours of old farm fields. And each field, dune and grove has its own name – given by farmers and hunters to navigate these ‘savage’ area.

Still the dunes are constantly moving; by the wind but more often by men. After all, it is a water-collection area and national park. And as it is common practice in The Netherlands nature ‘must’ be managed (‘must’ deliberately between quotation marks because you may question that). And so you see that this apparently flat and agricultural landscape has a lot more to tell.My bulbs show the layered landscape and the cooperation between the sea, the wind and men creating the ‘Duin-en Bollenstreek’.

This Giant bulb is adopted by Geenport Ontwikkelings Maatschappij (GOM), Hillegom