Ineke van de Pol is a Dutch visual artist and cultural advisor. She obtained a BA in Social Sciences and Pedagogy from KU Nijmegen (1981) and an MA in the same subject from University of Amsterdam (1988). She has also studied at the Royal Academy of Arts The Hague (2006-07) and the Art Academy Haarlem/Leiden (2008-11).
Van de Pol has exhibited internationally with her most recent shows at Lago Sul in Brasilia (2018-19) and at Guangcai International Mansion in Beijing (2016-17). Before she settled in the Netherlands and became a full-time artist, Van de Pol worked as a diplomat. Her diplomatic agenda took her to many different countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia. Spanning over three decades, these experiences informed her later artistic practice profoundly. Currently, her work revolves around sustainability and humanity’s place within the natural world.
Her interest in those themes is reflected in her use of various mixed media techniques, for which she employs a wide range of processed materials, such as rubbers, resins or iron. Van de Pol recycles unorthodox painting materials to create brightly coloured multilayered compositions that carry the marks of life as a global world-trotter. Living in many different metropolises in various countries has taught her that irrespective of location and culture, city-dwelling necessarily involves a relationship with nature. In her view, man-made and natural processes, structures or places are two sides of the same coin.