40 Titles

mei 29, 2020

40 Titles

longterm art project as part of a continuing series

This one started with a study investigating Chinese-European relationship within economic political geographic interconnectedness.

The Project

It started in 2012 under the title 'Made in China', with a video created as a monumental intervention for a public screen of the Chinese European Art Center (CEAC) in Xiamen, China. Then it got integrated into an installation at the annual art festival in the public space of 's Hertogenbosch (NL) that same year. The project continued as the material used lead to more related installations and objects. After a work period in China for the CEAC (2014), the project went further under the name and concept of '40 Titles', which originates from a public space art project. It involved asking 40 people in the streets of Xiamen, to provide a title for one of 40 small books to go with the final exhibition. Each title offers a completely different 'entrance' and with that a new context. This marked one in a series of interventions during the stay.

Exhibitions '40 Titles I' and '40 titles II'

'40 Titles I'

The presentation in the gallery of the CEAC (2014) was a total installation, as a residue of the stay, built up out of several autonomous elements. I used materials that had come to me. Like for instance food packages, the box of the new stove that got installed in the studio appartement, pruning waste from the coconut trees standing in the main road, alongside the beach of the peninsula, garbage that the tide brought in, dropped on the tropical beach. But also furniture from the studio (in line with the Personal Space Art Projects), digital video drawing that was created having in mind traditional Chinese ink painting. And photography, as a result of the long and slow hikes I do, in this case through the 3 million people city.

'40 Titles 1', CEAC, Xiamen, China, 2014

The main structure of the installation marked a large square, created out of Chinese clothes lines that were used in site specific interventions. The structure mimicked the way temples are build. It's ends marked another square; a rhombus, it's curly ends reminding of the expanding tree roots, characteristic for the region. The way the elements were structured within the whole, echoed the local city architecture, in which everything may coincide and is extendable for collective or individual needs. For instance the way city gardening is implemented: sometimes recognisable and well structured, other times unrecognisable united in a seemingly unstructured environment. That way even the open office of the gallery was incorporated. During the work period, a lot of thought went into notion about difference and similarity which lead to create some sort of (ostensible) balance within the installation. There were no clear boundaries. And natural and artificial material, shaped by the powers of nature, were displayed among artistic creations.

'40 Titles II'

In 2015 large total installation '40 Titles II' was presented at Cacaofabriek in Helmond, NL, covering the entire main exhibition hall with sculptural video installations, objects and (digitally modified) photographic work. Here a lot of the material gained during the residency was worked out. Also previous work. The idea of a borderless state of existence was taken to a maximum.

'40 Titles II', cacaofabriek, Helmond, NL, 2015

'Made In China', Artibosch, Den Bosch, NL, 2012

'40 Titles II', cacaofabriek, Helmond, NL, 2015

Gallery 'Urinoir Bezet', Lonneker, NL, 2014

'Made in China / 100% Integrity', site-specific, Art Unit, Haarlem, 2013

A solidified act retained in superlight white modelling material. The object holds the action of it's creation and the imprinted words '100 % integrity'. It's part of a series of seven sculptures of that kind. ( 2013)