MARK LIJFTOGT (1963) was born in Amsterdam but at the age of 6 he moved with his family to a small village a stone’s throw from Amsterdam, where he was to grow up and make his first steps into an artistic career. Indeed, he started drawing at an early age. The budding artist’s early drawings were rather of a cartoon-like nature. After having graduated from high school, he initially found employment as a dental technician in a dental lab. However, at 18 he decided to give up this job and moved back to Amsterdam to live on his own and explore different paths in life. He was introduced by a friend of his to the well-known sculptor and restorer Hans ‘t Mannetje, who ran a restoration studio in an old synagogue across the Rembrandt Huis in the center of Amsterdam. He came to be employed at this studio and worked there alongside skilled artisans specializing in various crafts, such as woodcarving, sculpture, carpentry, decoration and restoration. It was in this traditional setting, and owing to these artisans who shared lessons from a career spent analyzing the physical aspects of various types of paints and other materials, that he first discovered his love of time-honored techniques and classical painting. It was not long before he transformed his home into a studio and paid daily visits to the Rijksmuseum to study the Old Masters. The great art from the golden centuries of Dutch painting inspired him to start using oils as a painting medium, and these he has been using ever since. During his visits to the Rijksmuseum he also got to know its Chief Restorer, the late Mr. Kuyper, and his assistant, Martin Bijl. These experts have greatly assisted him in mastering the technicalities of panel and canvas preparation and surface treatment, without which it would not have been possible to achieve the exquisite smoothness and meticulous detail characteristic of his present work. Classical painting thus started to form the point... [http://marklijftogt.com/wp/biography/] undefined

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