Gerty Vos

One of the works in the serie ‘I am’  is the 'white flag'.

IS IT JUST A FLAG, OR IS IT A PAINTING THAT SYMBOLIZES BOTH UNITY AND THE VARIETY IN IDENTITY?

Gerty consciously chooses a symbol with which we are familiar, and which we are used to automatically convert into a conventional meaning, without us being aware of the material properties. Most of the time, we are as a rule less aware of the tactile material properties and of the color relations of such a white flag.

Gerty put it on the canvas in such a way that a tension arises between a well-known symbol as a flag and the material properties that characterize the painting: the construction of color to white in multiple layers that emphasize transparency.

The white flag is at the same time neutral in terms of identity, but also symbolizes surrender as opposed to the struggle that apparently belongs to identity that does not want to be 'neutral'.

The irony is that in white all colors are hidden without any struggle.

Soldiers who showing a white flag in their hand should not be attacked. One expects a person wearing the white flag to remain neutral and obliged not to enter into warfare.

The white flag is known as a sign of surrender. For example, Islam means literally "surrender to God." Surrender as a counterpart of separation and distinction.

The colored flag and even the black flag create an 'own' identity and forms a means of binding a people, a group and symbolically distinguishing them from others. Once there is an fear of loss of identity, the need for ide See also the "je suis Charlie" which was massively deployed facebook (on the photo and profile picture in the colors of the French flag).

A kind of symbolic identification with the victims who would stand for freedom, and the shared sense of the threat of losing freedom and a protest and a fight for its preservation. I see this reaction as a part of the spirit which focuses strongly on identity and fear of losing freedom.

Gerty sees these reactions as a part of the spirit of the age that strongly focuses on the fear of losing identity and freedom.