Hannelore Houdijk graduated from the art academy in Breda at a young age and subsequently completed a master's degree at the Dutch Art Institute in Enschede. After graduating, she received a starting stipend and has been exhibiting at home and abroad ever since. She has won several prizes, including the national competition 'Painting of the Year 2019', 'Entrepreneur of the Year 2021' and reached the semi-finals of 'Artist of the Year' in 2023.

In her studio in Nederhorst den Berg, Hannelore makes realistic, colorful and intense paintings. She researched a new way to create still lifes. After various experiments, she discovered that by placing objects in the water and photographing them, surprising images were created. Her compositions are distorted by water and light and give the image a dreamy atmosphere. Some parts are recognizable and other parts are abstract. To capture this beautiful image in paint, Hannelore has developed a special way of painting. She calls it 'optical painting'. Where realism involves painting very finely, Hannelore paints with coarse and fine strokes combined, which only become realistic from a distance. From a distance the painting looks like a photo, but up close you see rough spots of color.
These paintings illuminate age-old porcelain art objects and contemporary art in a completely new way. The paintings excel in contrasts, such as old-new, small-large, light-dark, above-underwater, near-far and abstract-realistic. As a result, the paintings demand the attention of and create interaction with the viewer.