Sort of a Bio

I was born in the year The Beatles broke up and Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix died and on the same day of the year as Andy Warhol was born and Velázquez died. I am about 2 meters or 6'6" tall and weigh 86 kg, weather permitting. I studied econometrics (or mathematical finance if you prefer), philosophy and literature at the Erasmus University Rotterdam, the University of Leiden (both The Netherlands) and University College London.

I am a choreographer, photographer and researcher/theorist. In my spare time I work with an investment bank. I love dark chocolate, dark bread, tea and ice creams. The best ice cream I ever had was at Gelateria Gianni in Bologna.

An artist to me is first and foremost someone with a curious mind, a mind that is constantly probing the world and uses whatever medium to express this curiosity. In that sense to me there is no difference between my research, my performances, my photos and my videos. This is also why I prefer to say what I do rather than what I am.

In 2001 I was a visiting scientist and artist at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. In 2005/6 I was a guest lecturer in the Dance Unlimited program of the Arnhem School of Dance, a post-graduate course in choreography. Together with my students we studied different ways of cointegrating critical theory and dance practice.

My research applies insights from philosophy, cognitive neuroscience, psychology, mathematics and sociology to the study of art in general and dance and choreography in particular.

Recently the gap between my research interests and artistic work on the one hand and my work in finance on the other, which had long been separate endeavours, has been shrinking, as I've become more and more interested in globalization, urbanism and emerging markets.

My artistic work arises from the friction between my formal interests in structures and patterns and my predilection for "dirty realism". In 2004 I created a full evening choreography for the former Ballett Frankfurt, now The Forsythe Company, Communications from the Lab. I'm currently working on a number of projects in which all of my current interests will come to the fore.

I have presented my work and research at festivals and conferences in Los Angeles, Toronto, Boston, Berlin, New York, Frankfurt, Lisbon and various other cities around the world.