Puck Soetens (1970) lives and works in The Hague. In 2014, she completed her studies at the Fotoacademie in Rotterdam. Since then, she has been working as an independent portrait and fine art photographer. With her ongoing series “Portraits of a Flower” and “Portraits of the Sea,” Puck seeks a painterly representation of the familiar. She draws inspiration from the still lifes of painter Jan Mankes and other neo-realists. With a deep-rooted interest in nature, Puck is fascinated by the beauty and uniqueness of flowers and the unpredictability of the sea and its surroundings. In both series, she captures the most beautiful combinations of color and form, aiming to invite the viewer to pause and appreciate everything that makes nature so beautiful. In addition to her use of color, Puck’s photos are an ongoing study of negative space, symmetry, and light. She is also intrigued by the intersection of stillness and motion in the creation of her images. Puck’s work is purely photographic. The images are crisp and seemingly simple, yet they possess a painterly quality. She consistently seeks harmony and tranquility within an atmospheric and contemporary realism.