'The Yellow Tower' by Marjan Segbroek
About this activity.
From August 1 to August 31, 2026, Marjan Segbroek, an artist from The Hague, is exhibiting a cityscape in gouache at window gallery ‘De Prachtvink’ at the Vinkhuizen shopping center, Platinalaan 505a, 9743 GZ Groningen.
‘The Yellow Tower’ is a gouache on paper (A4 size) from 1999 and depicts the surroundings of the city skyline as it looked between 1984 and 2011.
In April 1969, the Mayor and Aldermen of the Municipality of Groningen proposed establishing two new streets in the area between the Helperzoom and the Sterrebos: Engelse Kamp and Kempkensberg. Offices for national government services were to be built on the site, designed by architect Klaas Gerrit Olsmeijer. The first three towers were erected in the early 1970s. The fourth tower rose in 1982. The towers were named Towers I through IV. To make the office giants a bit more exciting, the Government Buildings Agency issued a commission in 1979 for a work of art intended to define the city's silhouette. That commission was awarded to Frans and Marja de Boer Lichtveld. They came up with the idea of giving the towers color (red, blue, green, and yellow) by placing a check mark on the top corner of the building. The work consisted of colored material and neon lighting (executed by Gebroeders Ten Have on Peizerweg), so that the towers would be visible from afar in the dark. The artwork had no name, but the artists saw ‘flying night birds’ in it. The work was completed in 1984.
When the new DUO building, the so called ‘Cruise ship’, at Kempkensberg, was constructed in 2011, the towers were demolished. The yellow one was the first to go down in the autumn of 2011. During the demolition, the DUO art committee considered giving the artwork a new home, but this never materialized. Segbroek captured the yellow tower from an upstairs apartment on Tressenplaats, where she was staying in February 1999.
Marjan Segbroek (1966) lived in the city of Groningen in the late 1990s and created a series of gouaches of cityscapes that were commonplace at the time but now seem to originate from an exotic world. Nowadays, Segbroek lives and works in The Hague, where she has dedicated herself to conceptual art, which she publishes and exhibits under various pseudonyms.
The window gallery is an exhibition space that can only be viewed from the outside, but 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The gallery is illuminated until 11:00 PM.
Every month, a new artwork by an artist is exhibited.
Raamgalerie De Prachtvink.
Raamgalerie De Prachtvink is een 24-uurs galerie aan Platinalaan 505a bij Winkelcentrum Vinkhuizen. De galerie heeft als specialiteit internationale mail art.
Location.
Raamgalerie De Prachtvink
Platinalaan 505
9743GZ Groningen
tel 050-2302991
prachtvink.blogspot.com/