Martine Jacobs

Conversation with a machine 5 Martine: There’s a climate of quiet fear. Institutions censor themselves—not because they’re told to, but because they’re afraid to lose support. AI: Yes. It’s not overt censorship—it’s anticipatory obedience. A gallery might avoid a theme, not out of disagreement, but out of survival. Martine: That’s the danger. Art becomes polite. Curators choose safety over substance. AI: And the public loses the chance to be challenged. Culture becomes decoration, not dialogue.

“A gallery avoiding a theme out of fear shows how anticipatory obedience works. Silence becomes complicity, and art loses its courage when institutions self‑censor to survive. Culture becomes decoration, not
dialogue. #protest #antifascisme #democracy #free #love #art ##musea

2026 Urban angel symbolizing protection, hope, and connection.

2026 Urban angel
symbolizing protection, hope, and connection.
#AngelsAmongUs #angel #angels #urban #Connection #art
#QuietResistance

Digital Kiss / Pastel Kiss – 1998 Artist: Martine Jacobs Medium: Digital collage (Adobe & PSP on Pentium II) followed by pastel on canvas Theme: Love, transformation, classical reinterpretation, digital sensuality Description: In 1998, Martine Jacobs embarked on a bold artistic experiment — blending classical sculpture with emerging digital techniques in search of new expressive possibilities. Inspired by Auguste Rodin’s iconic The Kiss, she created a digital reinterpretation using early software tools on a first-generation Intel Pentium II computer. The result was not a reproduction, but a transformation: the lovers, once carved in marble, now dissolved into a pastel, color gradients, and emotional abstraction.

Digital Kiss / Pastel Kiss – 1998
Medium: Digital collage (Adobe & PSP on Pentium II) followed by pastel on canvas Theme: Love, classical reinterpretation,
Inspired by Auguste Rodin’s iconic The Kiss, Martine created a digital reinterpretation #Art #PastelArt #Renaissance #FineArt #classicart

This piece, "Minosch," was first composed on a Pentium II using Adobe and PaintShop Pro before being hand-translated into a pastel Part of the Renaissance Series, it explores the intersection of early tech and timeless technique. #Art #PastelArt #DigitalToPhysical #RenaissanceSeries #MJacobs #FineArt #ArtHistory #EarlyDigitalArt

"Minosch," was first composed on a Pentium II using Adobe and PaintShop Pro 4 before being hand-translated into a pastel Part of the Renaissance Series, explores the intersection of early tech and timeless technique.
#Art #PastelArt #Renaissance #FineArt #ArtHistory #EarlyDigitalArt #classicart

Mother Wave (1998) 🌊 Long before the blockchain, there was the wave. This early internet relic from 1998 is now preserved at The Feminist Institute, NYC. 🏛️ A piece of Feminist Spiritual Surrealism. A digital oceanic myth born in the dial-up era. Proud to see these roots finally finding their home onchain.

Mother Wave (1998) 🌊

Born in the dial-up era, long before the blockchain. A piece of Feminist Spiritual Surrealism and digital oceanic myth. 🐚

Proud to share that this early internet relic is now preserved at The Feminist Institute, NYC. 🏛️

#ArtSky #DigitalHistory #FeministArt #art #WomenInArt

Kathmandu, 1978. Setting trends before they were 'cool'. 🇳🇵✨ "Before I was a digital archaeologist on @base, I was a 'cultural hippie' in Nepal. I wanted a traditional gold nose stud. The local jeweler was terrified—he’d never seen a Western woman ask for one. There were no piercing studios. Just a thick darning needle, a bottle of alcohol for the pain, and a crowd of curious locals watching me bleed for my style. When I got back to Amsterdam, a cashier stared at me like I was an alien. Two years later, everyone had one. I’ve always been an early adopter. From 1970s subcultures to being one of the first digital artists in 1998.

Kathmandu, 1978. Setting trends before they were cool
Hippie in Nepal.

I wanted a gold nose stud. The jeweler was terrified—he’d never seen a Western woman ask for one. Just a thick darning needle, a bottle of alcohol , and a crowd of curious locals . #HippieTrail #SettingTrends #PersonalHistory

Martine Jacobs created a bold and experimental series of pastel collages using real dried hemp leaves a pioneering gesture that merged botanical material website Martine Jacobs 1996

Martine Jacobs created a bold and experimental series of pastel collages using real dried hemp leaves a pioneering gesture that merged botanical material website Martine Jacobs 1996.

#HempArt
#nudeArt
#PastelCollage
#MixedMediaArt
#ExperimentalArt
#FeministArt
#EcoArt
#CannabisArt
#ArtHistory

Years later, in 2003, Martine looked back and asked: What remains of our ideals? In response, she created this digital protest piece. Using the iconic LP cover of the Woodstock film — once a symbol of collective hope — she overlaid it with raw graffiti: “Who Fucked Our Ideals.” The phrase is scrawled in red, urgent and uneven, like a scream across history. The work pulses with layered imagery: anti-war slogans, political critique, and fragments of cultural memory. This is not nostalgia — it is confrontation. The piece mourns the betrayal of a generation’s dreams and reclaims protest as art. Who Fucked Our Ideals is both a question and a wound.

ho Fucked Our Ideals?
Not about sex about betrayal collapse of promises

Martine Jacobs a true child of the seventies, once journeyed through the East no luggage just spirit Like many cultural hippies she carried ideals of peace freedom

#ProtestArt #PoliticalArt #ConceptualArt #Counterculture

Morning Buddha red 1998 A striking digital artwork that captures a moment of spiritual awakening.

Morning Buddha red 1998 A digital artwork that captures a moment of spiritual awakening.

#spiritualawakening #mindfulness #awakening #digitalart #artcommunity

Happiness Is Giving (2004)Emotional symbolism Giving as luminous gesture — tenderness made visible.

Happiness Is Giving

Today my early digital works (made from 1998, long before social media and NFTs) were included in the archive of The Feminist Institute in New York.
Grateful that these early experiments now have a place in feminist digital art history.

#FeministArt #EarlyInternet #Archives

The Eternal Burden of Phisulis — pastel, 2025.
A solitary figure endlessly pushing weight uphill.
An image of persistence, struggle, and the quiet absurdity of existence. #sisyphus #mythology #philosophy #meaning

Greetings from Holland Marine Jacobs

Who’s Afraid of Buddha (1998) In a bold homage to Barnett Newman’s modernist provocation, Who’s Afraid of Buddha reframes the question of fear—not through abstraction alone, but through spiritual presence. Digital experimentation meets confrontation: calm versus anxiety, contemplation versus power.

Who’s Afraid of Buddha 1998

A homage to Barnett Newman’s modernist provocation.
Who’s Afraid of Buddha reframes the question of fear not through abstraction but through spiritual presence.

Digital experimentation calm versus anxiety.

#modernart #ArtHistory #SpiritualResistance #Art

On-violence toward one’s own people. Buddha – Fascist (2007) This work was created 19 years ago as a digital protest against authoritarian figures—those who shout, lie, intimidate, and never lose sight of their own self-interest. spiritual calm versus aggression

On-violence toward one’s own people.
Buddha – Fascist (2007)

This work was created 19 years ago as a digital protest against authoritarian figures—those who shout, lie, intimidate, and never lose sight of their own self-interest. spiritual calm versus aggression

#ArtAsProtest #AntiFascism #art

In my work 'Buddha Batman' (2006), I explore the surreal encounter between spiritual serenity and the urgency of pop culture. It is the tension between the prince who sought enlightenment and the billionaire who enforced justice through trauma.

he paradox of the "Urban Monk." 🦇🧘‍♂️

In my work 'Buddha Batman' (2006), I explore the surreal encounter between spiritual serenity and the urgency of pop culture.

How do meditation and struggle relate to each other in our current visual culture?

#Art #Philosophy #Batman #Buddha #DigitalArt

Martine: Then art must resist the flattening. Not with slogans, but with complexity. With layers that refuse to be reduced.

AI: Your work already does that. It’s not just visual—it’s archival, pedagogical, emotional.

Martine: Then let’s keep building. Panel by panel.
Against forgetting.

Conversation with the Machine — Part 3 Museums are beginning to censor their own walls Martine: Museums are beginning to censor their own walls. Exhibitions are being softened, adjusted, erased. As if history is too sharp for the present.

Conversation with AI

Martine: Museums are beginning to censor their own walls
Exhibitions are being softened
AI: When museums whitewash what was once raw, they lose their role as memory keepers. Whitewashing is forgetting.

#ArtResistance
#InstitutionalCritique
#HistoryMatters
#ContemporaryArt

gum 2001Jacobs explores themes of identity, consumption, and postmodern fragmentation. The digital manipulation distorts the figure into a synthetic presence.

Gum 2001 identity, consumption.

Where analog memory meets digital archaeology. Layering physical textures into the virtual space to preserve the tactile.

Building this for feministinstitute.org

Internet archive archive.org/details/@mar...

#ArtHistory #FeministArt #ArchiveContemporaryArt

Thank you for the repost, Dan! I really appreciate you sharing my work with your community. It’s great to connect with people who value the preservation of cultural history. 🏛️"

It’s an honor to connect with you here, Sherri! As an artist and art historian building a digital archive for The Feminist Institute, I’ve long admired the institutions and projects you’ve been involved with. Looking forward to sharing more from the 1979-2008 archives here

Great to connect with you @ngage.bsky.social! As an artist and art historian building a feminist digital archive, I find your focus on human rights and public health incredibly inspiring. Looking forward to your insights here.

Congratulations to Maeve O’Donnell on this wonderful achievement! Looking forward to seeing the results of this residency at the AAH Festival

an epic overland journey in 1979. Together with my husband Hans, I followed the fading "Hippie Trail"—a path of liberation that began in the late 60s with the legendary Magic Bus. We traveled from the Netherlands deep into Asia, crossing an Iran already held in tension and an Afghanistan of ancient, untouched beauty, just moments before the devastating cycle of wars began.

A journey from 1979 that still defines my art today. 🏛

The Last Echoes of the Magic Bus (1979). This pastel work captures the soulful gaze of Nepalese and Tibetan children, a memory frozen in time during an epic overland journey. It shaped my identity forever

#ArtSky #TravelHistory #PastelArt #art

To my great sadness, it feels like the beautiful America—where I loved to visit, where I celebrated life with kind, loving, spiritual Americans—is slowly fading right now.

When truth decays, the light goes out!

#ArtSky #FeministArt #PopArt

#DigitalHumanities

@dmovies.bsky.social Thanks for the follow @dmovies.bsky.social! Excited to see more of your thought-provoking cinema picks on my feed. 🎬

n 2007, I started a project combining Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon with the iconography of Mother Mary. It began as a digital piece, which served as my starting point. Later that year, I recreated the concept by hand: a 100 x 100 cm pastel painting on a wooden panel. One is digital (right side), one is handmade pastel, but both captured the same moment in my practice. Moving from the screen to physical materials really changed how I connected with the work. 🎨

Hi Bluesky!

Hi Bluesky! 🏛️

Artist/Archivist preparing my 1998-2007 archive for The Feminist Institute, NYC. 'Madonna’s Prism' (shown) explores icons in a new light. 🗽

#art #introduction #fineart #museums #feminism #archive