Beyond Generations and my ‘first’ encounter with design

‘Traces #1: Beyond Generations’, Van Abbemuseum Eindhoven, 7 October – 5 November 2017. In collaboration with Design Academy Eindhoven, curated by Annemartine van Kesteren, in collaboration with Bart Guldemond and Ellen Zoete.

The Dutch art crowd probably is fully aware that in not too long, one of the biggest cultural events of the year will take place in Eindhoven: the Dutch Design Week. Across the city there will be hundreds of activities and presentations spread over nine days. For some reason I have always ‘avoided’ a visit, mostly because this always coincided with the first exam period of the year at university. So this year I am glad to say I will master the courage, energy and money to spend not one, but TWO days in the always sunny Eindhoven to see some design from the lowlands.

But before I head off to the event, which takes place from 21 to 29 October, I visited the Van Abbemuseum’s new design exhibition ‘Beyond Generations’. As the title suggests, the exhibition spans multiple decades and investigates how different generations of designers have interpreted the discipline over the last 70 years. The exhibition is the first in the series ‘Traces’, a project by the Design Academy in Eindhoven that for the next five years researches the traces that design has left in the city of Eindhoven, the region of East Brabant, the country and in the entire world. In ‘Traces #1: Beyond Generations’, this is done through eight central themes that show the dialogues between designers, accompanied by artworks from the collection that reflect the social and cultural environment these designers were working in.

As the title suggests, this has probably been the first proper introduction I have had with design and definitely the first exhibition I have actively visited on the theme. This is why this exhibition did something totally different with me and my thoughts. Over the years, I have seen dozens of art exhibitions with artworks of several periods, media and themes so I have become quite familiar with the vocabulary of the art exhibition. But design is something else. So what do you do when you encounter something unfamiliar? You try to fit it in the mould of what you do know. Which was exactly what happened to me in the Van Abbemuseum on a Friday morning. I entered the rooms and approached the works as individual, autonomous artworks. And although there definitely are many artistic and autonomous qualities to design, there is something essentially different to it: design has a clear purpose. On display in the first room were objects such as lamps, rugs and even a coffee machine. Although they come in many shapes and forms, there is no universal lamp for instance, but always a universal purpose: to bring light. To many art objects, especially in the contemporary field in which I majored, there is not necessarily such a universal purpose. Art can often be made for the sole purpose of just ‘being there’, the old idea of ‘art for art’s sake’, one of the key ideas of the avant-garde in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Despite there being many similarities between autonomous visual art and design, to me this is one of the main differences between the two.

I have to say, it did slightly help me that the design objects in the exhibition were paired with several artworks from the museum’s own collection. When I entered, at first I struggled to make sense of the design vocabulary, simply because I was not yet familiar with it. So I approached it with my own art background, trying to find a deeper, often theoretical meaning behind the designer’s choices, which might not necessarily be there. There was a certain disconnect between what I was seeing and what I was thinking. It was only about halfway through the exhibition when I realised I was doing this. But then  I was faced with a dilemma – do I continue this approach or do I find, maybe even invent another way to look at the remaining design objects in the exhibition?

I did the latter. Instead of trying to place the shown objects in an artistic theoretical context (which I have to say did work for some of the objects!), I tried to see them in a social, practical and aesthetic light: WWTDD? What would the designer do? And all the sudden, a whole world opened up to me. I took a different and close look to the object, seeing how the designers on show use different materials and make aesthetic choices that might improve a utility or sometimes undermine its function in pursuit of form.

Two works in the exhibition particularly stood out for me. The first is already present in the second room of the exhibition, that focuses on the theme of ‘social transformation’. Several drawings of knitted sweaters and an accompanying video present the work of Loes Veenstra, who spent fifty years of her life knitting sweaters that had never been worn. In 2012, a parade in the 2e Carnissestraat in Rotterdam was held in honour of her knitting achievements. This is shown in the video, where you can see several hundred people walking, dancing and singing around in the streets wearing Veenstra’s colourful creations. On the panel to the left, drawings of the knitted sweaters are presented by Christien Meindertsma. What struck me most about this work is that initially, I did not necessarily realise what knitting sweaters had to do with design, but when I watched the video I saw the society being brought together and being connected through the medium of clothing. Social transformation in a positive way had been made possible in the shape of a colourful parade across the street where Veenstra lived, being carried around and being the centre of the entire happening. It also made me aware of the fact that design is such a broad concept: not only utensils and products are designed, but you can also design societies and influence behaviour in a way, which is another present theme in the exhibition.

Another outstanding work was on show in the final room of the exhibition, one of the three rooms that does not have a central theme but focuses on the dialogues of different (generations of) designers and how they relate to one another. Here, a friend pointed out a work that shows a very modern side to design, one that focuses on technology and mass production. The work consists of three stacks of different materials that represent the manual work of one person in one day that works in the manufacturing of smart devices (phones, laptops or tablets). The devices have been reduced to some of their basic elemental components, like screens for smartphones or the brown mineral that’s part of the devices’ hardware. This work, bordering on the verge of art and design, shows how we might take the technique behind a device for granted, not realising how it is produced, the materials and the manual work that go into them. It made me think about our relationship to technology, in a day and age where our emotional attachment to technology grows and often lets us forget that it is ‘just’ a product as well that can be replaced.

So yes, in short this exhibition might have been my design relevation. It opened an entire new way of thinking for me and gave me new tools for looking at and interpreting design objects. Let’s put it to use next week during the Dutch Design Week and stay up to date for my review of what I thought of it!

Opening Ecovention Europe at De Domijnen Sittard

On 3 September, the exhibition ‘Ecovention Europe: Art to transform ecologies 1957 – 2017’ opened in Museum de Domijnen, Sittard. I attended this opening on a very sunny Sunday afternoon, because 1) the museum is only a 10-minute bike ride away, 2) I am very interested in ecological art, 3) during my bachelor I had to read a book by the exhibition’s curator Sue Spaid, which I really enjoyed, and 4) it gave me a great excuse to get out of the house on an otherwise wasted day. So I mounted my blue two-wheeled stallion and cycled to the new location of Museum de Domijnen in Sittard, which is now split up into two locations, one for historical art and the city archive and one for contemporary art.

The opening was opened by director Tom de Rooij, who talked about how the exhibition came about both creatively and financially. He then gave the microphone to Sue Spaid, curator of Ecovention Europe, who was wearing a very appropriate skirt for this special occassion!

Sue Spaid talked about how the museum approached her to work on this exhibition. She has retired from curating, but the theme and subject matter of this exhibition were so close to her own research and her own heart that she decided to take up on the project. She spoke more in debt about several projects that artists have put on for Ecovention Europe, like Koen Vanmechelen’s Chicken Project (where people are invited to take home a chicken that matches their DNA best for a set period of time).

The exhibition was then opened for the public. The art collective Touchstone Collaboration did a performance called Sacred Mayonnaise, starting with a statement to support the gardens in Sittard. The performer shown above then started with an egg, adding oil to the yolk in a sacred-like ritual to make mayonnaise. A second performer started laying out edible flowers and fruits on a table. When the mayonnaise was ready, the performers invited the audience to eat the mayonanise and produce from the local garden. The exhibition was then officially opened for the audience to have a first walk around. (Note: this vegan of course did not try the mayonnaise, but from what I heard around the room it tasted very good!)

I haven’t been to the new museum building yet, so it was a lot to take in to visit both an exhibition and discover a new building. But I was very impressed by both of them. The building is clean and has a logical floor plan, resembling the classic white cube. Lately I have visited a lot of exhibitions that steered away from this idea, with walls that are more colourful and works of art that were more shattered across the wall or room, but I ain’t mad of seeing a white cube art gallery if it’s done correctly. Here it certainly works well with the exhibited art, which are very diverse in both subject matter and medium and do not need a lot of distraction from how the exhibition is built.

The exhibition is sorted into eight themes, with a lot of overlap: several artworks are classified into more than one category. This is a way to roughly structure the exhibition, but because of this overlap it doesn’t matter much in which way you are viewing the exhibition. If you are not interested in one theme or want to solely focus on another one, you can just choose whatever you want to see, because there’s plenty of it. Very smartly done by the curator! The selected themes are: activism, valuing anew, biodiversity, environmental justice, restoration/reclamation, food security, climate change, and oikos (well-being).

One of the first artworks that you see upon entering is 431art’s project BotanoAdopt, where you can literally adopt a plant from somebody who isn’t able to take care of it any more, as if it were a pet. A great initiative that is a good example of our current sharing economy. I definitely became interested in adopting a plant or two, but I’m not sure if the cats would love that…

A familiar face in the exhibition was Brandon Ballengée, an American artist who had presented work in De Domijnen Sittard before in 2014 (back when the museum was still called Het Domein and was settled in the old location). He exhibited three works from the series ‘Malamp Reliquaries’ from 2013. He researched amphibians that were deformed as a result of pollution and presented these frogs as mythological creatures, giving them names like ‘Pandora’ and ‘Procrustes’ (shown here on the left and right). The prints are classified under the theme of biodiversity, but definitely carry an activist note in them as well: if we don’t do anything about water and soil pollution, the inhabiting amphibians will suffer, lose their ability to carry out normal tasks and might not be able to reproduce in the future.

Artist collective N55 has been publishing ‘how to build’ manuals since 1994 for structures that focus on mobility, public space, renewable energy and urban farming. People across the world can replicate their efforts, as long as they credit N55. Shown on this poster are some of the objects they made between 1994 and 2017. The picture on the bottom right is a bike that helps to clean the air, which is also on show in the exhibition.

To conclude: the exhibition was both a great overview of what has been done in ecological art over the last decades and what is currently going on in eco-art. Curator Sue Spaid managed to make a perfect selection of works and seamlessly connects the broad canon of eco-art with local projects around Sittard. De Domijnen has a one of a kind exhibition in its hands here that can easily become one of the landmark shows in contemporary ecological art. The museum has so many wonderful artworks on show, as well as other projects around the city, that a single visit would almost sell the exhibition short. This is more than an exhibition, this is also a statement in itself: it is time to take not only our environment (both globally and locally) seriously, but also the art that focuses on that. The exhibition is urgent, activist, current and most of all, absolutely stunning.

The exhibition ‘Ecovention Europe: Art to transform ecologies 1957 – 2017’ will be on show in Museum de Domijnen Sittard from 3 September 2017 to 7 January 2018.

Moving is in every direction

Moving is in every direction. Environments – Installationen – Narrative Räume. Hamburger Bahnhof Berlin. 17 March – 24 September 2017. Curated by Anna-Catharina Gebbers and Gabriele Knapstein (assisted by Ina Dinter).

The Hamburger Bahnhof is one of my all-time favourite museums in the world that I have visited up to this day. When I visited Berlin earlier this month, we of course had to go there. Apart from a great own collection, they also have very relevant and interesting temporary exhibitions. One of the exhibitions that was on show during our visit, was Moving is in every direction, a massive exhibition with environments and installation atworks from their own collection and other museum and private collections.

Where the majority of the exhibitions tend to focus on two-dimensional artworks or a mix of 2D and 3D, an entire exhibition with big-scale artworks where the visitors can immerge themselves in is refreshing. This calls for a big presentation room though. Luckily, the Rieckhalls of the museum building and a majority of the west wing provide more than enough room for the twenty-odd installations by many renowned twentieth-century artists. In short: the exhibition really interested me. Not only did the enormous size of it offer enough exercise, it also offered more than enough mental stimulation. Following are some highlights of the presentation:

Wolf Vostell, Elektronischer Dé-coll/age, Happening Rau E.d.H.R., 1968-1982, Collection Nationalgalerie Berlin.

Bernhard Leitner, Ton-Röhre, 1973-2008, loan of the artist.

Robert Kusmirowski, Transition, 2009, loan of the artist.

Peter Fischli & David Weiss, Ohne Titel (Fragen Projektion), 1981-2003, Friedrich Christian Flick Collection in Hamburger Bahnhof.

Christopher Kulendran Thomas, New Eelam, 2017. Collaboration with Annika Kuhlmann, loan of the artists.

Pipilotti Rist, Remake of the Weekend, 1998-2017, Nationalgalerie Berlin, donated to Flick Collection in 2014.

Marcel Broodthaers, Un Jardin d’Hiver, 1974, Friedrich Christian Flick Collection Hamburger Bahnhof.

Joseph Beuys, Das Ende des 20. Jahrhunderts, 1982-1983, Nationalgalerie Berlin, Sammlung Marx.

To conclude: the exhibition was very beautiful and intruiging to me, because the displayed artworks could be experienced more. Environments stimulate a more active approach with the artwork because you can walk through them and use more senses to experience and appreciate them. A very interesting exhibition indeed, a must see if you’re around Berlin before the end of September.

Simone Albers; Matter of Existence

Museum het Valkhof Nijmegen. 18 July – 3 September 2017. Curated by Isabelle Bisseling.

I have been working at the Valkhof Museum in Nijmegen for almost two years now and over the years I have seen many exhibitions come and go. It’s only every once in a while that one of these particularly catches my eye. The small solo-exhibition ‘Matter of Existence’ by Nijmegen-born artist Simone Albers (1990) is one of them. The project is a collaboration between the museum and Derde Wal, a collective for contemporary art.
Curator Isabelle Bisseling saw a shift in Albers’ way of presenting her artworks: she started to make use of the full room and no longer chooses to only hang her work on the walls. Bisseling invited Albers to make an installation in the atrium room of the Valkhof Museum to experiment with a new way of presenting art.

‘Matter of Existence’ is a very interesting project from a curatorial point of view that appeals to my own taste. First, I’m intrigued by the fact that the project is curated by a young curator and a young artist. It’s inspiring to see young people in the art world creating such wonderful exhibitions. Secondly, it’s not just the curator that has a say in the way the artworks are presented, which tends to be the standard in the artworld. She basically gives the artist the reigns to take matter into her own hands, but it is more than just the concept of ‘the artist as a curator’: it is a special collaboration between these two parties. Too often you see that either one of these has the upper hand, but a project with the aim to bring these two together is something I haven’t seen much and it intruiges me. Albers’ way of displaying her artworks in the room, all part of the installation ‘Matter of Existence’, aims to provoke a more direct confrontation with the visitor: ‘One will feel small in the grandness of the universe, but will also realise that even the smallest particles are a vital part in the grand scheme.’

Simone Albers’ works are an aesthetic commentary on scientific research. She has investigated natural phenomena and scientific theories about the universe, the evolution of the earth and the processes that play a part in this. She tries to comprehend the complexity of existence to look for the mechanisms that hide behind what’s visible, whether this is microscopically small or incomprehendably large. In the installation on show in the Valkhof Museum, several existing works are brought together with new work that were created for this room and exhibition. What’s particularly wonderful about this exhibition is the fact that it looks very complex at first, but when you take the time to literally walk through the exhibition, Albers’ way of thinking becomes clearer and clearer. You can see how she tried to materialise her thoughts into her artwork, how to give ‘matter’ to the concept of ‘existence’, which explains the title too. In addition to that, the project is also a very aesthetically pleasing presentation. It’s colourful, bold, interesting and there’s plenty to see. It’s like you’re able to walk through Albers’ mind that tries to grasp the concept of nature, physics and existence. This makes the exhibition a true joy to not only watch, but to fully experience.

http://simonealbers.com/  // All pictures by the author.

Linda visits: Best of Apprentice Master at Kunstpodium T

Some of you might know, some might not, but around a month ago I started working at Kunstpodium in Tilburg, The Netherlands. It is a platform that up until this year worked with fourth year students from art academies across Europe in the so-called Apprentice Master project. Here, twenty exhibitions were held last year across several Dutch art venues where a renowned artist, the master, sets up an exhibition with and coaches the students, the apprentices. The program is pretty unique in the Netherlands. Starting next year, we will start working with new graduates instead of graduating students, so there can be more focus on the artistic and professional development of young artists after the academy.

With this background information in mind, four of the best students from the last season were nominated for one last ‘Best Of’ exhibition that will take place in Kunstpodium T from 13 July to 27 August. One of them would be selected as the winner of the Jan Naaijkens Prize, which would be awarded on the opening night on the 13th of July. As now an employee of this art institute, I got a very close insight of the artworks by the artists, that I got to know quite well, and of course I was there on the opening night too.

First I had the honour to provide the crew with a delicious dinner in the wonderful garden. Pictured here are the four nominated artists Maureen Jonker, Nuni Weisz, Chris Rijk and Machteld Steukers, as well as two performers, a volunteer and the managing director. After having filled our bellies, it was time for the panel of judges, consisting of four esteemed art professionals from the Brabant art scene, to announce the winner. But all in time – first I would like to show you the work of the four competing artists, because the artworks are all wonderful in their own way.

Maureen Jonker (Helmond, 1994; HKU) works in the grey area between photography, painting and installation, combining these media and placing them next to each other. From this blend she creates an illusory environment, where the two-dimensional and three-dimensional come together. Jonker explores the relationship between the human body as prop or as an attribute and shows the sculptural approach of the body inside the self-created environments, thus using the human body as a layer of reality. The live registration of a human body, stretched and posed for a long time. Without the use of photo editing programs she keeps the effort of human activity and unevenness in her self-created environments.

The work of Chris Rijk (Woerden 1995; HKU) is provocative, avant-garde, controversial, feeding the discourse, pro-anthropocene, post-digital, non-conformist and unmistakably contemporary. The work is lighthearted but thoughtfully layered and drags art and kitsch together to question the value and legitimacy of the path of arts he has chosen to walk.

Starting from the love for everyday and functional materials, Machteld Steukers (Diepenbeek, BE, 1993; PXL MAD Hasselt) wants to dwell on their temporality and how she can make sure that this can be cherisched and preserved. How can the love and attention, that she gives them, be present for eternity? How can the context of an object change by merely changing its matter? Styrofoam made out of porcelain will no longer have the same function? This interaction is the common thread running through her work.

Nuni Weisz (Caracas Venezuela/Israel 1985; HKU) made a very impressive installation in one of the four rooms, where visitors were invited to play (with) the works. Most impressive in this room (in my opinion) is a giant paper circle attached to a wooden wall, with a small device that people can use to make it work like a barrel organ. The visitors are invited to turn the small crank and make the paper scroll in the installation play a lovely tune. In addition to these works, she also showed a wooden piece in the garden where two people are invited to make music; one person puts their head into a hole in a tree trunk and the other person plays a composition so the person inside the trunk can hear it.

Nuni’s installation is poetic, understandable and lighthearted. It was no wonder she was chosen by the judges as the winner of the Jan Naaijkens Prize. She wins a stipend of €750 and a solo exhibition in TAC Eindhoven in early 2018. I briefly spoke to her after she was announced as the winner and she was very much blown away and humbled. She told me that she wrote the musical composition for the big round installation (in the left corner of the picture) herself, and that she would love to make a giant forest with similar works that combine music and art where the visitors can immerge themselves in.

Nuni receives the prize from jury member and artist Paul Bogaers.

The exhibition will be open until Sunday 27 August and can be visited on Saturdays from 13.00 to 17.00, on Sunday 30 July and 27 August from 9.30 to 14.00 during the Dwalerij market and by appointment. The new Apprentice Master season will start in October.