33
The Prop Master’s Collection 2016
Art exhibition spaces do not just consist of exhibition halls. They have large hidden spaces, where other activities are going on, preparing, repairing and storing of all the necessary materials for exhibitions. By taking the ‘backstage’ of the exhibition space Kunstvereniging Diepenheim as a physical and artistic subject, this artwork aims to monumentalize this art institution’s knowledge and experience and how it has been dealing with art, objects and material. In this work, 47 standby / resting objects (22 pairs and 3 items) have been rearranged within specially constructed shelves. The objects were gathered from the workshop, archive room, reception room, kitchen and the barn outside of KVD near the border of the village Diepenheim.
4.5 x 6.5 x 30 m | Site-specific work | Found objects at Kunstvereniging Diepenheim and smell of basement | Kunstvereniging Diepenheim, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Modus Operandi | Photography Rik Klein Gotink
32
United Perspective 2016
This work was specifically made for the Rijnzaal in the Museum of Modern Art Arnhem, a room which overlooks the river Rhine and was specifically designed to offer a wide view of this beautiful landscape. In response to this, I took the exhibition space as a central subject and amplified this narrative of the room. I built a wooden platform wrapped in a half-transparent meshed textile so as to sculpt the space from the main window to the window on the other side of the room. It allows visitors to walk across from one viewpoint to the other. It also attempts to activate visitors by provoking energetic bodily movements while they walk on this platform. This approach creates a geometrical relationship between the inside of the room and outside. It expands this relation through the body, space, and across the entire landscape outside of the window.
5.5 x 5 x 12 m | Site-specific work | Wood, mesh, etc | Museum of Modern Art Arnhem, Rhine room (Rijnzaal), Arnhem, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, MILLENNIALS | Photography Eva Broekema
31
Lookout Cabin 2016
This artwork was specially made at Paleis Soestdijk, where the Dutch royal family is used to live. I made a wooden construction in the manner of ‘negotiating’ with a tree, a 250-year-old Acacia. It offers an image of coexistence, human made and nature made. Both support each other and it embodies the complicated beauty of the process between dying and living, as well as the process of recovery. From a distance, visitors experience a sculptural intervention in the forest. Coming closer they are directly invited to climb up on it and are able to explore the tree/structure, and – arriving on the top – they get an overview and a new perspective of the area.
7 x 6 x 2.5 m | Site-specific work | Wood, etc | Paleis Soestdijk, Baarn, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, BAL! | Photography Ayako Nishibori
30
Mirrored Mapping 2016
This project was specially made at a historical house designed by Gerrit Rietveld for Cordemeijer’s family. It is a private house in active-use during the exhibition. De Stijl architecture is an inexorable and lasting style. How do the composition and colour, based on theoretical principles, effect on the daily choices of the actual residents? With this question as the starting point, this artwork is the outcome of my research ranging from art, architecture and design, to anthropological analyses of diverse factors of the house. It aims to expose the everyday life and history of the family under the roof of De Stijl, Neo-plasticism concept. I built a temporary pavilion in the yard reflecting the actual house, which can be seen as a sort of cabinet of curiosity, where various artefacts of the family, artworks, historical figures, everyday belongings and music coexist.
2.5 x 2.5 x 5 m | Site-specific work | Wood, plastic roof, a collection of the current house owner (ceramic bench, train landscape, music, etc.) | A residential house, a protected monument, designed by Gerrit Rietveld for Andre R. Cordemeijer’s family Apeldoorn, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, organized by Suns and Stars, Arrows Shot from the Bow | Photography Peter Cox
29
Wilful Blindness 2015
What constitutes unrepresentability in our time? How do you represent the unrepresentable? When visual representations become imaginary commodities and saturate our world, draining their subjects of meaning? Or when their symbolism becomes so loaded their demonstrative existence falls prey to acts of iconoclasm? Whether through personal or communal repression, misuse or misunderstanding, the unrepresentable is, perhaps, a feature of all things. 50 tonnes of clay was installed in W139. With this fundamental and freshly dug material, eight artists made sculptural reliefs without the aid of sight, from the beginning until completion. This highly physical process, along with its logistical and functional solutions, takes over the exhibition space in what becomes an impressive translative manifestation of imagination. The quantity of clay used for this piece accentuates the developments of not only the sensory adjustments used in making the reliefs themselves, but also the adaptive navigations of the space.
2.5 x 7 m | Site-specific work | Clay | W139, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Wilful Blindness, initiated by Anami Schrijvers and Kate Bicât | Photography Ayako Nishibori
28
Mining Future Project 2015
Approaching the institution as a whole, specifically, the art society ‘Arti et Amicitiae’ in Amsterdam as a physical and artistic subject – and a possible ‘mining’ site – this project explored the institution’s historical resources and drew them out of the background with a look toward the future. It shed light on the backstage of Arti et Amicitiae on the occasion of its 175th Anniversary and consisted of three approaches. The first was to exhibit the collection of ‘standby objects’, which have been kept behind the exhibition halls. The second was to give a guided tour for visitors to explore the historical elements of the building. The third was to sand down the layers of the exhibition wall and collect the accumulated dust as the source of a new pigment for future artwork. I demonstrated how to prepare the pigments and handed them out as special souvenirs of the 175th anniversary.
5 x 7 x 4 m | Site-specific work, performance | Map, monitors, frame, collection from backstage of Arti et Amicitiae | Arti et Amicitiae, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Tomorrow never knows
27
The Fall – transition into the better 2014
This project explores methods of recovery and self-healing abilities, spanning different values of human creation in serious global recessions, natural disasters and human errors. Spring festivals are valuable keys to study how humans attempt to handle the power of nature and transform it. I built a tower as a festival stage that included a ‘stream of water’, a ‘mountain’ and a ‘fireplace’. The tower faces an actual tree behind the museum wall, connecting the inside of the museum to the outside, inviting visitors to sense the seasonal changes outside. It allows the public to climb up the tower. I organized six events that referred to a variety of spring festivals from around the world that address ways of purifying and renewing life while driving negative sprits away. I made costumes, tools and other items. I handed out the instructions to carry out each festival in order to let viewers do it at home.
Basler Fasnacht and Morgestraich (Basel, Switzerland)Omizutori-Secret method of collecting water and purifying by fire (Buddhism, Hindu, Zoroastrianism)Holi hindu-spring festival colour’s day (India)Silvesterklaeuse (Appenzell, Switzerland)Là Fhèill Brìghde (Celtic relations, Ireland, Scotland) Oruro Carnival, salt and mask (Oruro, Bolivia)
8 x 2.5 x 6 m (main construction) | Site-specific work, performance, research | Wood, LED lamp, water and mixed media | Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, The Netherlands | Solo project (exhibition and 6 performances in 6 months) | Theodora Niemeijer prijs 2014 | Photography Peter Cox
26
Manners to Faintly Suggest a Territory 2014
‘Uchinokoto – house, family, inside and I –’ is a self-organized group project in Japan and the Netherlands. Nine Netherlands-based artists explored a comprehensive artistic viewpoint of various territories. This offered a comparative study and way of looking at contemporary Japanese living conditions alongside those in the Netherlands and Europe. My project, Manners to Faintly Suggest a Territory, explores physical and mental ‘in-between’ spaces by field research, events, workshops and my own collection of people’s stories. I brought all of the results together into a site-specific installation in the venue, CBK Amsterdam, by looking at the character of the architecture there and the multiple functions of the organization. This artwork intended to bridge all of the different sections by making a ‘gap’ into a gentle binding mechanism. It also gives visitors a physical and imaginative overview of the space.
5 x 8 x 3 m | Site-specific work, performance, research, workshop, lecture, publication | Wood, paper, clay, potato paper | Art project space Akibatamabi 21 (3331 Arts Chiyoda), Tokyo, Japan | CBK Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands | Self-organized group residency /exhibition, Uchinokoto – house, family, inside and I – | Participated artists: Sayaka Abe, Nina Glockner, Nicola Kirkaldy, Judith Leysner, Nishiko, Iede Reckman, Ian de Ruiter, Makiko Shinoda (designer) | Photography Ayako Nishibori | Made possible by AFK (Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst), Mondriaan Fonds, Dutch embassy, Stadsdeel Oost Amsterdam
25
The Hut – a quiet wedge 2013
This artwork was installed at the busy roundabout on Hoofdorpplein in Amsterdam, a site surrounded by cars, trams, busses, many shops, and people. Reacting to the appearance and history of the location, I built a handmade, sound-absorbing hut for the public to enter and recover their sensitivities within the quiet space. The door was open for everybody during daytime hours over the course of the three-month art festival ‘KADS 2013.Finding visual similarities in the shape of Hoofddorpplein and the series of El Lissitzky’s lithographs was my impetus to unfold the history of the Suprematist art movement and its influential composition of the urban development of the cityscape. By referring the historical link of El Lissitzky’s ‘Proun’ project, I wanted to make a platform to rethink our ‘well-being’ and reconsider Lissitzky’s message in the context of society today.
4.5 x 2.5 x 5 m | Site-specific work, public space | Wood, concrete, styrofoam, isolation material, etc. | Hoofddorpplein, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Art festival in the neighborhood of Schinkel, Amsterdam West | KADS (Kunst aan Schinkel) | Photography Gert Jan van Rooij
24
Current Washes Ashore 2013
This project was done in collaboration with the artist Nishiko in the residency program ‘Badgast’ in Scheveningen, on the Dutch coast. Our focus was based on the impact of a tsunami, hydrologic cycles and ocean currents. We made experiential studies of these themes and conducted various activities to examine the methods of reading weather, and analysing marine debris at the port of Scheveningen. We also visited several institutions to study the mechanism of high waves at sea, wind power, water management in the Netherlands, ocean current mapping, and survival techniques from floods in as told in legends and religious stories. We admire the fact that the principles of nature are logical yet incomprehensible because of nature’s vast scale. In order to understand it better, we dissected this subject, and shrunk it to a small scale that we could observe as a whole.
Collaboration research work with Nishiko | Mixed media, found objects at the beach of Scheveningen, the North Sea | Badgast AIR organized by Stichting Satellietgroep | Exhibited at GEMAK, Den Haag, The Netherlands | Group exhibition | Photography Jhoeko
23
Connect Windows and Sleep 2013
In response to the concept of this exhibition about the specific way in which every person measures space, I built a hanging, wooden platform connecting two windows in the exhibition space. The platform also offered a place to sleep, thus, it became possible for visitors to walk through the passage and sleep there. In the words of the organizers, “by setting American, Dutch and Japanese artists, with an expansive and varied approach to the issue of space in their work, in a collaborative setting distinctions of history and culture and local may recede allowing revision of individual perceptions.” This piece was less about the units of measure and “the divide between metric and standard measures” and more about “the meaning and underlying origins that quantify or qualify and entire culture’s approach to space.”
7 x 2 x 9 m | Site-specific work | Wood, steel, bed etc. | Artist run exhibition space, Billytown, Den Haag, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Another metric
more to look
22
The Scope in the Swell Waves – error-handling strategy 2012–13
It is my personal experience that many unfortunate events occurred worldwide in the year 2011. Confronting the scenes of destruction by the 2011 Great Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, together with other scenes of worldwide crises gave me a strong feeling of powerlessness and brought about an accompanying recognition of how fragile human technology and the world itself is. Although this sense of entanglement has stayed in my daily life, I have held close to the definition of art and human creation that deals with ‘the limits of the body, and the possibilities of the mind’. Whether individuals with personal stories, or scientists with specialist expertise or others, we can all make observations about how to improve societal problems and make positive transformations. Through this research, I wanted to create a new landscape to celebrate being in this world with our own human perception and experience.
7 x 10 x 20 m | Research, site-specific work, performance, collaborations and events | Mixed media | KiK (Kunst In Kolderveen), Meppel, The Netherlands | Project with guest collaborators and advisors: Annemiek Cornelissen (scientist), Stéphane Douady (scientist), Ariel Lindner (scientist), Sabai Anouk Ramedhan-Levi (architect/artist), Dafna Nur (artist), Nina Glockner (artist), Nishiko (artist), Treehouse (musician), Ank Daamen (artist), Eiko Ishizawa (artist), Esther de Graaf (artist), and more | Great KiK prize | Prix de Rome long list nominate | Photography Ayako Nishibori
21
Beeper Station 2012
This artwork explores a possible intervention in an active hospital. It aims to infiltrate into everyday life of hospital workers. By using a model of beeper system – actively used for internal communication network–, I made an additional beeper station in half of the original size and filled with chocolates that looked like the original beeper machines. I installed it under the original and made it accessible for all workers. Chocolates were refilled randomly in order to get close to the appearance of the original.
60 x 5 x 250 cm | Site-specific work | Wood, fair trade chocolate | Medisch Centrum Haaglanden, Den Haag, The Netherlands | EGBG | Group exhibition, BETER, de kunst van gezondheid
20
The Field – an exercise to be an optimist 2012
This project offers visitors a new perspective by transforming a dirty and dark parking garage into a positive, exciting playing field. The idea of playing golf in such a place sounds absurd. Working with this idea, I built a handmade golf course following a nonsensical design with a steep slope and a large concrete beam obviously blocking the path of the ball towards its goal. This approach aims to increase visitors’ playfulness and happiness while encouraging them to tap into their own rich imaginations whilst hitting balls and trying to get them in the holes. It is a universal and useful exercise for all generations. This work was exhibited together with 54 other artworks in the parking garage, and actively used by local boys and girls during the exhibition. This project developed into a series. Since 2012, several offers have been put forth for it to be made in other locations.
3 x 3 x 12 m | Site-specific work | Wood, metal wire mesh, golf club, trophy, etc. | A parking garage ‘KLIEVERINK’, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | FATFORM | Group exhibition, PRESENT FOREVER 55 Contemporary Dutch Artists | Photography Ayako Nishibori
19
Unclosed Chronicle 2012
This art project created an opportunity to commemorate and designate a location for a local festival that has been lost for more than 10 years in Lo, Belgium. Lifestyle changes in today’s society have made it difficult for every community to keep their traditions and hand them down to the next generations. In Lo, the giant doll festival stopped, and it is no longer possible to share it with the next generation. People have stored the giant dolls in an old building and forgotten them. In order to give a chance for the new generation to experience this festival and explore an exciting rumour, I took the role of a stranger, a little Japanese woman builder, working alone to build a ‘giant’ handmade dollhouse outdoors next a local playground. The doll ‘Marieke’ was installed in the dollhouse after some cleaning and retreatment. This project was realised as part of the art festival in Lo.
4 x 3 x 6 m | Site-specific work | Wood, a giant doll of the village Lo ‘Marieke’ (380 cm) | A playground (a public space), Lo, Belgium | Group exhibition, Kunstfestival
18
Hair-washer District 2012
By taking the role of a hairdresser, I can create an intimate space to provide a special service - ‘washing hair’, which in turn opens the senses of seeing, listening, feeling and smelling. This work spotlights each person’s story and life, and plants a seed of new public relations between art spaces and local activities. In turn, the artwork becomes a meeting point, while the exhibition space is turned into a sort of hair salon, open to the public. All of the necessary equipment was installed: a special handmade seat, a sink, a barber’s pole, chairs, tools and a water boiler. Shampoo and conditioners were carefully selected to be suitable for every hair type. In the waiting room, a variety of magazines and newspapers written in different languages awaited the visitors. Not only art lovers, but also neighbourhood residents could fully enjoy the beautiful architectural elements of this monumental building.
6 x 3 x 12 m | Site-specific work | Wood, shampoo, hair dryer, magazines, etc. | A former hospital building | Stichting outLine (Bradwolff projects) | Solo exhibition, Hair washer district, AFK (Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst) | Photography Ayako Nishibori
17
Map the Silence 2011
I stayed at the Vredeskerk cathedral for two weeks in order to research the 24-hour-activity of the church. I built a wooden structure as my office with a bed inside of the cathedral. From there, I could (almost) see the entire space of the Vredeskerk, allowing me to thoroughly observe the architecture, phenomena and customs of the cathedral’s visitors. I frequently engaged in spontaneous contact with church visitors. Later, I documented my observations and experiences in the form of drawings, objects and sculptures. As a result of the stay, I built a passage of light by connecting both the eastern and western windows. During my stay at the cathedral, I counted its bricks as an everyday activity. I created a performance ‘Select a brick, wash it’ for the opening ceremony of the exhibition.
3 x 3 x 9 m | Site-specific work, performance, research | Wood, textile, counting machine, bed, etc. | Het Vredeskerk, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Solo exhibition, DRIELUIK nr. 2/3", De Tribune, De Tribune
16
Night Stroller 2011
This collaborative work together with Amsterdam-based artist Q Hisashi Shibata explores the form of a time-based visual poem, and merges our common fantasy of the conjunction of western and eastern cultures. We made costumes and items site-specific to the architecture of the location, and inspired by each of the 12 performers we had selected. The performance started with two micro-procession-operators entering the busy restaurant, and gently clearing the table. They demonstrated the micro-procession on the table. An actual procession went through Wibaustraat and entered the restaurant. An opera singer appeared on the balcony and sang 'Till I see you again' (a song by Kiyohiko Ozaki), while the micro-procession climbed up the pillar to reach the ceiling. After the song, all performers walked around through the tables and out the door.
Performance, choreography, collaborative work | Mixed media | Trouw gebouw, Amsterdam, The Netehrlands | Poezie for Dinner | An event a part of Art in Amsterdam 2011
15
Grow with the Flow 2011
On the invitation of the project Paleisje voor Volksvlijt – Caleidoscopic, I had the opportunity to search for new connections between art and science in a collaboration with bio-physician, Dr. MMV Annemiek Cornelissen. After four months of explorations, we gave the performance 'Grow with the Flow' to represent the fundamental mechanism of the birth and growth of all living beings based on the ‘Saffman-Taylor instability’ concept. In the form of a one-night event, the public could see the entire process of the experiment at Felix Meritis. With this experiment at the centre, the event was held together with other performers, musicians and storytellers to celebrate a meeting of arts and sciences, and moreover to celebrate all kinds of living things.
4 x 3 x 3 m | Site-specific work, performance, collaboration research project | Wood, water, liquid laundry detergent, plexiglas, etc. | Felix Meritis, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group project, Paleisje voor Volksvlijt/ Kunst en Wetenschap/ Editie 1, Paleisje voor Volksvlijt | Collaborate with Bio-physicist MMV Dr. Annemiek Cornelissen
14
The Field – an exercise to be an optimist 2010
The Zuidas, Amsterdam-south area is developing as an international business centre with the conscious intention of promoting rationalisation and efficiency in an optimistic manner. With a nonchalant and neutral appearance, the order has been established by a blanket covering-up of the emotional, psychological, and economic realities of the worldwide crises. If this expresses a vision of our future, we must deal with the feeling of monotony, facelessness and a regulated life. This installation focuses on a possible exercise to be an optimist in such a situation. I built a special 'field' for this exercise by tuning into specific characteristics of the area and working with them. By playing golf, we must diminish our curiosity, emotion and primal wildness through a simple repetition of hitting balls toward the goal. We learn to keep going, while trying to keep depression, inertias and other urban syndromes at bay.
4 x 3 x 12 m | Site-specific work, performance, research | Wood, metal wire mesh, golf club, etc. | De Kunst Kapel, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Vrije Ruimten Zuidas, AIR Edition 4 Virtueel Museum Zuidas
13
The Gate 2010
As soon as we enter the building we confront a huge hall that seems based on a measurement system far from our daily lives. Taking some time seeing and being, our senses adjust over time. This artwork emphasizes this processual stage of vision and the physical mechanism of seeing. At the same time, the process of walking through the artwork assists us in our ability to sense the entire building in a much more careful and richly felt way. It especially encourages viewers to recognize the beauty of the building’s grid structures and how the building is in a changing state, moving from the past to the future. By providing these experiences, I want to crystalize viewers’ moment of seeing, and help them memorize the building in a state of transition.
4 x 5 x 4 m | Site-specific work | Wood, cement, textile, etc. | A former STORK factory building, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Beeld Hal Werk | Group exhibition, Beeld Hal Werk, dit is nu de nederlandse Beeldhouwkunst, Beeld Hal Werk | Verbeke foundation (2010–current)
12
The Fortress 2009
This artwork intends to represent my impression of the human body in Japanese society. Using the enlarged shape of a baseball catcher’s mask, I wanted to emphasize people’s personal territory and how they suffer from a superficial interpersonal communication society.Rapid growth in information technology has made it easier to connect with others without actually facing one another. It has made a flow of contact where confrontation with unknown people is unlimited. On the other hand, it is a phenomenon that has led to an increase in crimes related to this contact and has made people afraid of unfortunate encounters. New IT influences how people behave in the real world, so that people now tend to refuse face-to-face communications with others. Their social masks have become stronger and bigger, serving as a fortress to protect them from their faceless enemies.
1.5 x 1.5 x 0.7 m | Sculpture | Wood, lacquer paint, textile, duvet, etc. | Stichting Souterrain Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, What about Japan
11
Adoration of the Boy 2009
The exhibition space is a former chapel that features 16c Christian paintings. This artwork puts an image of today – a heroic boy – side by side with a young Jesus.I have made a wooden frame decorated with mass-produced daily items and sweets glued on top, sprayed entirely gold. It stands in the middle of the space with a raw, unfinished appearance in the back. In the frame, I installed an image of a crying boy on transparent plastic paper, they kind of paper used for Japanese TV animation. The emptiness of the image of the crying boy framed with such a superficial gold frame could confront the heroic figure of the Christian paintings filled with all their drama. My installation co-exists together with the ‘real treasures’ of the museum, their value and quality.
3 x 1.5 x 1.5 m | Site-specific work | Wood, candies, kitchen equipment, gold spray, a sheet of animation | Museum Gouda, Gouda, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Nederlans 2
10
Urban Wild Life 2009
This artwork attempts to create a new mythology in a public park in Amsterdam. It is based on the idea that some creatures are sophisticated enough to develop their own high standard of urban life. It consists of four stories and related items that have been installed in ten spots in the park. Baby gasholder is born in a pond in front of the original / mother gasholder. Check-in counter is built in front of a bush, suggesting possible events inside the bush. It represents the human activity of demarcating borders in the middle of open land. Rabbit fire-extinguisher Rabbits in the park organize their own fire department. Seven fire extinguishers are installed in the park.Lorry works for lost properties and transports them through ‘a highway’ in the park everyday. When people find lost property in the park, they put what they have found in the wagons.
Consists of 10 artworks | Site-specific work | Mixed media | Culture Park Westergasfabric, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Cross Over
9
Method for X 2009
This artwork explores a new industrial area in terms of its conceptual and perceptual potential.In this type of industrial area, objects are in a rough material state, and haven’t yet entered our daily lives. I want to make these objects perform as ‘the air of an industrial area’. I have taken the shape 'X' which is one of the architectural structures seen in the exhibition space. It is also a symbolic character for the fundamental question of how you can make it possible for art to thrive in a new cultural space in such a location. Through this process, I visualized a hybrid shape between 'X' and 'O'. These transformative steps merged questions – as a form – into a new structure in the space.
6 x 6 x 3 m | Site-specific work | Wood, epoxy, etc. | P.ART of your life, Zwolle, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, OPMAAT
8
Fotozaal – homage to an unknown person 2009
‘The moment of realization is blinded by a bright light.’Our faces have been systematically registered in today’s society. Our images need to be protected and stopped from getting into the wrong hands. This is especially important when somebody takes your portrait without asking. In this performance every visitor was forced to be photographed without any clear explanation why. The scene unfolded as soon as the visitor being photographed moved to the front of the frame, and could see him or herself centred within an extremely ornate golden frame. They became aware of how they appeared in the photo by looking at the next person standing in the frame. After being photographed, visitors filled in an application form in order to identify their portraits from amongst hundreds of others. 160 portraits were taken and sent by post as a special gift to celebrate life in today’s society.
2.5 x 5 x 5 m | Performance | Wood, candy, kitchen equipment, gold spray, camera, etc. | Vlaams cultuurhuis De Brakke Grond, Amsterdam, the Netherlands | A performance festival Project Perform 08/09
7
Ballad of CAUTION – the heroic paraphernalia 2009
Every city has a similar aim of becoming an effectively functioning metropolis. In view of this I want to emphasize how visions of a ‘great’ city are most always characterized by ideas of a clean city. Urban cleaners carry out a daily ritual with highly-improved cleaning equipment, whilst cushioning fears of emergency sticky situations. In order to monumentalize this phenomenon, I built an enlarged bucket, mop and spray bottle on a cart as an armoured and neurotic vehicle. All these structures seem fragile and weightless compared to the volume of the whole installation and the exhibition space, thus exposing the heavy solidity of the structure that is at the same time a mass of fragility.
13 x 2 x 3 m | Sculpture | Wood, duvet, etc. | World Trade Centre Amsterdam / OC&W (Ministry of Education, Culture and Science), Den Haag / Westergasfabriek, Amsterdam / Het Glazen Huis, Amstelpark / Kennedy van der Laan, Law office | Solo exhibition, organized by Virtueel Museum Zuidas
6
Salt & Pepper & Mop 2008
A procession has a beginning and an end in its line. It needs some certain elements to make 'fade in' and 'fade out'. At the head of advancing line, I would like to clear the way with wishes for a success of the procession and our ‘good’ life in the city. It is a performance playing with a ceremonial manner, purifying the street with salt and pepper. Salt and pepper are dairy necessity on our table, often taken for a ceremonial situation. Pepper has been a main spice and a reason why the city, Amsterdam was grown as an international port in the past. 2 performers are working and throwing salt with a repeated gestures based on sign language to tell, 'death', 'big family', 'small family', 'gezellig', 'chatting', 'life' and throwing salt. 4 performers grind pepper with pepper mile with orderly resume.At the end of procession, I would like to clean up all dirt of the city with an 11-metre-long mop. At the same time, to gather and carry all dirt into the goal, the exhibition space, W139 in order to exhibit them. After that, all objects have been exhibited at w139.
1 x 1 x 11 m | Performance and exhibition | Salt, pepper, pepper mill, wood, steel, duvet, etc. | Walking through the city, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Ontferm U, a procession – walking exhibition in Amsterdam, W139
5
Live Maquette 2007
This artwork emphasizes a personal ‘viewpoint’ and makes it possible for that view to be shared with others. I first made a table as a platform. Looking out the window of the exhibition space, I could see a primary school and its yard, trees and all kinds of objects. I built a see-through maquette on the table, and installed miniature objects based on the actual school equipment I could see from my standpoint.During the exhibition, I scanned pupils’ activities in their schoolyard, and demonstrated their actions by moving the miniature-sized objects on the table in the same manner. In this way, I wanted to expose a possible ‘triangular’ bridge between my perspective, what was happening outside of the window, and audiences’ perspectives, in order to capture and share specific viewpoints in that very moment.
1.5 x 3 x 2 m | Site-specific work | Wood, concrete, bamboo sticks, etc. | Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, End exam exhibition, Gerrit Rietveld Academie
4
Column 2007
Every architectural space is conceived for a specific function and concept. However, the face of a building does not always describe its interior, and a building can be given a new function or purpose fairly easily. The facade can be ripped off to reveal another reality. Photographs and stories about the process of renovation spurred my interest in uncovering exhibition spaces. It has led me to see the original state of a building’s physical body, and take a conceptual and spatial approach. The building of the exhibition space at W139 is more than 400 years old. I took an actual supporting structure, a column, as my main subject. I made an imitation of the column by using thin wood sticks and cement with an additional bottom part that looks like an uprooted foundation. It aims to de-contextualize and disentangle the original column from its 400-year-‘responsible’-‘heavy’ job within the exhibition space, while showing full respect for this long-standing architecture.
7.5 x 1.5 x 1.5 m | Site-specific work | Wood, concrete, bamboo sticks, etc. | W139, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, End exam exhibition in W139, Gerrit Rietveld Academie
3
Sequence 1 2007
The physical state of an object metamorphoses over time. Looking at a series of different states on a timeline shows a sequence that could expand either backwards or forwards. Amplifying this sequence by joining its two ends together, a circuit is formed: past and future flow into each other. An object’s existence loops around without any start or end. I made an installation based on this model taking cement as the main material, and at the same time, a source of inspiration. It looked like a three-dimensional animation of how a small building would be constructed. Viewers could walk around the sequence and enjoy a perspective that contained a whole series of moments simultaneously.
1.3 x 1.5 x 3 m | Site-specific work | Wood, concrete, bamboo sticks, etc. | Arti et Amicitiae, Amsterdam, The Netherlands | Group exhibition, Cinema de Bricolage 3, Arti et Amicitiae
2
Hair-washer District 2007
This art project explores a possible intervention in an active Christian church produced by an artist without a Christian background. Washing hair is a daily ritual. In many religions, water has a symbolic significance for purification rituals, baptism being one of those rituals. By using water, I created a special time to provide a hair washing service for visitors. I built a high floor platform to give a special view from high above the ground. On this platform there were a specially-made seat, sink, and a set for heating water in order to run the service properly. The steam from the hot water rose up to the beautiful high ceiling in the icy cold space, generating the special acoustic effect of water and conversation.
4.5 x 7 x 10 m | Site-specific work, performance | Wood, shampoo, hair dryer, etc | Het oudekerk, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
1
The Passage 2006
This artwork exposes a layer of time that had been stagnating in the room of a former tuberculosis sanitorium in Beelitz-Heilstatten. Located in the middle of the Beelitz forest in East Germany, the buildings have undergone the passage of time, including the Second World War and the period of occupation by the Soviets. The buildings have been decommissioned and are beginning to fall apart. I built a wooden passage leading from the entrance of the room straight out through the window. Visitors could walk on the passage and face the history of the room. I removed the linoleum from the floor, and hung it on the wall. Displaying it in such a way suggested unfolded old documents and uncountable footprints. Because the floor under the linoleum had red and black crusts like painful scabs, I interpreted the floor as a wounded patient, and thus treated it carefully with olive oil.
4.5 x 7 x 10 m, Site-specific work | Wood, linoleum, olive oil, etc. | Beelitz Heilstatten, Germany | Group exhibition, EEA 2006 Exhibition, European Exchange Academy
