M.V. Baks
Alter modernism - where technology meets nature
Grounded Truth
Grounded Truth is my series of temporary drawing interventions in public space.
With chalk, charcoal and intuitive lines, I bring drawings to pavements, courtyards and squares. The city is no longer a backdrop but an active canvas — a place where you are unexpectedly invited to pause for a moment.
Grounded Truth is my series of temporary drawing interventions in public spaces.
With chalk, charcoal and intuitive lines, I bring drawings to pavements, courtyards and squares. The city is no longer a backdrop but an active canvas — a place where you are unexpectedly invited to pause for a moment.
The work always appears suddenly, emerging from a word or a thought, and disappears again with the next rainfall. A deliberate choice: this impermanence creates space for presence. What remains is the moment you walked past it — in memory.
An encounter on the street
In Grounded Truth, lines, roots and symbols unfold across the pavement.
They move along quay walls, between market stalls, in front of my doorstep in Crooswijk, or across the concrete of the former overpass near Shell/Starbucks Hofplein.
Each intervention is different:
• #5 — On a market day, Noordplein, Rotterdam, 2025
• #4 — A gift for Anne, by the quay, 2025
• #3 — In front of my own doorstep, Crooswijk, 2025
• #2 — Starbucks – Shell Hofplein, Rotterdam, 2025
• #1 — Try Out Grounded Truth, the courtyard, Rotterdam, 2025
Related actions:
• Chalk drawings on the electrical utility box, Zuidplein, Rotterdam
• Chalk drawing on the bus station ramp, Zuidplein, Rotterdam
I work without a predetermined plan. A word from the Random Box, an interaction with a passerby, or simply the energy of the location sets the first line. From there, the work grows on its own—intuitively, in dialogue with the environment.
Mandala’s and impermanence
The philosophy behind Grounded Truth is the tradition of the mandala:
a mostly circular symbol of balance, wholeness and transience.
By working with chalk, the city becomes the carrier of something both fragile and inviting.
It can be touched, observed, stepped on — and it disappears as soon as the rain arrives.
That does not make the image less valuable; it makes the moment more valuable.
Grounded Truth does not judge and demands nothing from you.
It is open to interpretation.
You encounter it on your path, respond to it — and release it again as you continue your way.
A gentle interruption of urgency.
A small pause in the tempo we live in.
A brief step away from our screens.
Just you, the city, and a single drawing that asks nothing of you — except perhaps a little wonder.