Photo By Gail

For over 30 years, the drawings and was paintings of Lily Van Der Stocker (b. 1954) have subverted aesthetic expectations, employing an Easter candy color palette to depict clouds, flowers, swirls, and other traditionally feminine or decorative motifs. She annotates these compositions with handwritten texts – spelling out intimate thoughts, notes-to-self, and social niceties. The work is nostalgic and comforting, with squiggly patterns more likely at home in the margins of a student’s notebook than they are on the white walls of a gallery.

Though undeniably joyful, Van der Stokker’s work also speaks to weighty themes – aging, health, and, more generally, the lived experience of being a woman within patriarchal structures – placing on a pedestal what has traditionally been disregarded within the realms of “serious“ visual art.

On the High Line, Van der Stokker presents Thank You Darling (2023), a mural in her signature pastel and fluorescent-hued palette. In the center of a sky blue background dotted with multicolored simple flowers, read the words, “Thank You Darling,” written in a juvenile, arbitrary blend of lower and uppercase lettering. Van der Stokker’s puffy bubble-letters are a classic example of playful, adolescent penmanship, seemingly lifted right out of a teenager’s diary. The work actively engages with the park’s visitors, expressing gratitude to all those who pass, while reclaiming, at massive scale, intimate language that is often mocked as being feminine and unserious.

Thank You Darling was Photographed on the High Line Park, West of 10th Avenue, above 23rd Street. It Will be on View Through November of 2024.