Intro
In the years between 1997 and 2004, cartoonist Paul Kusters portrayed a divergent group of academics and staff members from Maastricht University’s Faculty of Health Sciences. Perhaps you know Kusters from his cartoon series ‘Toos en Henk’, which appears in many Dutch newspapers including De Limburger? The portraits and caricatures of the Health Sciences staff were published in Spectrum, the faculty’s magazine. Each quarter one staff member wrote a short article for this magazine, illustrated by his or her portrait. The editors tried to make a broad and rather random selection from all those associated with the Faculty of Health Sciences, such as researchers, instructors, support staff and also a student. Another striking feature of Spectrum was its design by the renowned graphic design bureau of Piet Gerards. Later on, after the Faculty of Health Sciences was integrated into the larger Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Spectrum ceased to exist and became part of the new faculty’s magazine.
Question
We invited all those portrayed to tell more about the portrait made of them by Kusters or about the period in which it was made. What was the specific occasion for their portrait? What were the early days of Health Sciences like? What issues were addressed in the articles they wrote for Spectrum? What did the staff members think of their portrait? Did it turn out well? Why or why not? Did they perhaps have a photographical portrait of themselves from the same period? Of course we did not expect those portrayed to reply to all of our questions. We were merely interested in gathering a range of responses concerning their portrait or the issues that mattered to them at the time.
Response
Most respondents indicated to us that the years between 1997 and 2004 marked a period in which Health Sciences saw steady growth as a faculty – even though things, as one staff member put it, were still ‘a little less hectic than today.’ From the various individual reactions we made a selection of texts that accompany the portraits. It turns out that most of the people portrayed still work for this same institution, even if in a different role. Some others are now employed elsewhere. One staff member, Jan van Maanen, has meanwhile died, while we also failed to contact a few of the people portrayed.
Interview
We also asked Paul Kusters to look at his series of portraits again and tell more about how he as a cartoonist evaluates them now. He thereby reflects on the formal language he chose, but also on why he zoomed in on some particular character trait of the individuals portrayed. As he stressed, he met them only briefly at best, while in some cases he only received a photograph as basis for the portrait to be made. His effort to ‘capture their soul’, then, should not be taken too seriously, for he barely knew his subjects. Paul Kusters’ comments on several of the portraits displayed can be found in the text clouds around them.
Mieke Derickx
Minderbroedersberg 4-6