Remembering Julius Vermeulen: Dutch Postage Stamp Design and Art Gallery Owner

Julius Vermeulen. Image Koos Breukel

The stamps on which Experimental Jetset combined masterpieces from the Stedelijk Museum with construction drawings, Doutzen Kroes portrayed on the square centimeter by Anton Corbijn and the last blue stamp of King Willem-Alexander. They wouldn’t have been there without Julius Vermeulen. For almost thirty years he was responsible for Dutch postage stamp design, which was recognized – even outside the world of philately – as art in miniature format.

Vermeulen, who died on Thursday morning at the age of 70 after a short illness, had an eye for quality that did not come from a stranger. As a graphic designer, his father Jan Vermeulen created the revolutionary fresh book covers for the Jan Wolkers novels that blew the dust off the dull 1950s. Wolkers’ sister Janna was his mother and, as a poet, she taught him a love of poetry.

Although Vermeulen loved his father – he was allowed to help color book covers as a child – he did not want to enroll at the Arnhem art academy, where Senior was vice-director. So he studied automotive engineering, which left him with a lifelong passion for the sound of Porsches. He also worked at Burgers’ Zoo, but after the premature death of his father he turned to the arts.

Aesthetic Design Service

“He designed one book cover for Jan Wolkers, but then he knew: I shouldn’t do this, I am an observer,” says Irma Boom. The now world-famous book designer was inspired to enter the profession by Vermeulen’s father and was working at the Staatsuitgeverij when she met her son, her future life partner, there. “When he walked in I knew he was my husband. I was at the beginning of my career and he has always been my biggest sounding board in everything. “Tree, that could be better,” he would say. He made me who I am today.”

In 1987, Vermeulen joined the PTT, which was then still a state-owned company and took a modern appearance very seriously. He came to work at the Aesthetic Design Service, which was then headed by Ootje Oxenaar, designer of the iconic Dutch banknotes that typify the high standard of Dutch graphic design in the second half of the 20th century.

“The Aesthetic Design Department not only did stamps, but also telephone cards, logos, all printing and basically everything that involved graphic design,” says Marie Hélène Cornips, Oxenaar’s successor. “Through his clientship, Julius has contributed to the development of generations of young designers. His great strength was that he not only found talent in unexpected places and guided them very carefully, but also knew how to get their work accepted by management. He never raised his voice but went all the way. If a design was rejected, he went back to the designer and kept going until he got it through.”

Unprecedented level of perfection

“Julius’ career developed in the context of economic development,” says architect Rem Koolhaas, who and his partner became close friends with Vermeulen and Boom from the 1990s. “He started at a state-owned company that wanted to radiate quality and ended up as a gallery owner with a very original agenda. In his work Julius combined a gentle character with great willpower, which increasingly came to light as his life progressed.”

Typical of this is the decision to give his great love free rein after leaving PostNL. He bought the vacant neighboring house and converted it into Galerie Eenwerk. There he showed international top artists such as Sheila Hicks, David Hammons and Steve McQueen, but also unknown talent such as Maud van den Beuken and Chae Eun Rhee. “Julius created exhibitions with a level of perfection that you rarely encounter,” says Claudy Jongstra, who is currently exhibiting in the gallery. “My presentation took more than a year of preparation. Julius wanted to feel, experience and know everything – an enormous commitment.”

About the different format that Vermeulen had devised for his gallery – always one work, combined with a publication – Jongstra states that it ‘brings the viewer but also the artist himself back to the essence’. “Julius made you focus very intently: what is it actually about?”

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2024-02-01 19:11:10


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