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One hand up and with the mask in front of the face. This is how the colourfully dressed baseball player guards the goal painted on the wall of the Archipel primary school on Atjehstraat. Children can put a ball in his big glove. Or better: aim well and throw. It will then roll out again under the other hand. So it is not just a sculpture that you can look at.
This 'Baseball Catcher', for that is the title given to her sculpture by Berry Holslag, has all the characteristics of a Holslag sculpture: the large and colourful ceramic figures with which this sculptor is widely known. This despite the fact that it is one of her early ceramic sculptures. After her training at the Free Academy (1965-1969) in The Hague, Holslag made abstract sculptures of wood. In 1973 she began to make figurative ceramic sculptures and play objects for schools. The Baseball Catcher is one of them. The colours, in this case bright green and yellow, are splashing. Because Holslag builds up her figures from logical blocks that correspond to reality, they are easily recognisable and accessible. In the sculptures she has made since then, this structure has only become more schematic and balanced.
Diagonally across from the 'Baseball Catcher' is another ceramic figure. That is the 'Little Guy' by Jan Jaap Horstink. Together they literally give the schoolyard the necessary colour. At the same time, they offer the children a few extra playmates that they make full use of.