Born in 1973 in Groningen, the Netherlands, (Marie) Paul studied at the Minerva School of Fine Arts in the same city, where he specialised in lithography and drawing. On completing his degree in 1998, his work was nominated for the Hendrik de Vries Stipendium. In 1999, he was commissioned to create a series of sculptures for the central garden of the Academic Hospital of Groningen. Since then, his interests have shifted towards painting, and in 2004 a collection of his work was exhibited at the Horst-Janssen-Museum in Oldenburg, Germany. Exploring de psychology of his subjects, using both realism and symbolism, he sees his paintings as a means to express the “fragile, spiritual world between life and death”. His work evokes the “happy sadness” of good memories as well as the other more melancholy memories life throws up, especially of farewells. Paul sees this view as the essence of life. Although one only can only really appreciate it fully when one has reached the end of it, his work sets out to try to capture it anyway, filled with a Proustian sadness at the impossibility to ever fully revisit the happy memories of the past. De Bie’s early work reminds us of the frozen precision of the old masters and new-realist movements of the early 20th century. Lately there has been a clear change towards a more spontaneous and expressive way of painting. Paul worked in Paris, Antwerp and is currently working in Barcelona, where he has his studio. Pics