I had thought, on starting this composition, that I should define what humour means to me. However, every time I tried to, I had to go and lie down with a cold wet cloth on my head.

- Dorothy Parker, The Most of S.J. Perelman

Drinking beer with a nul artist ... If I were to organise a gallery again, it would be family oriented ... I want to be as trendy as possible but I am not so good at it ... I don't know what I am doing ... Going backwards is a movement too ... Shit, art is dead ... God help me find shape.

These quotes are just a few examples of texts that appear in the almost two-thousand drawings Lily van der Stokker has made over the last twelve years.¹ I had to resist the temptation to quote more of them. At first glance her texts are neither spectacular nor ambiguous; rather, their power lies in their simplicity and lack of ambiguity. Summarising them alone would do little justice to the humorous impact of her work - some of her texts are capable of making me laugh aloud. Her art consists primarily of colourful drawings and wall paintings with texts, occasionally accompanied by objects such as sofas or box-like sculptures. The texts themselves are never a play-on-words, but resonate with the force of linguistic events. Their impact arises precisely from their specific relation to their form - articulated volumes and spirals, exclamation marks, (hand-written) fonts and an almost flickering use of colour. These 'bullets made of sugar',² above all, work closely with the