On January 23, 2020 I won the George Verberg Grant 2019.

With the grant, I will be able to study the mysterious world of living flying insects. For the project, I will visit 63 places in Germany where for 27 years scientific research was done to measure biomass. The study showed that the decline in flying insects is more than 75% in these 27 years. For the study, the life of the flying insects had to be stopped. I want to find out what their living, moving world is like. I’m going to find ways to understand their dynamic movements as a human. For that, I will translate their movements physically (with dancers), in relation to space (with projection and light/shadow movements) and as notations (drawings, visual language).

The end result will be shown in Groningen in January 2021.

Photo: Henk Tammens

For the project WHAT IF… by SIGN and Noorderlicht, I was asked as an artist to investigate a utopian/dystopian future of the landscape in the Northern provinces.

I will start with the idea that we have to live together with the sea in a new way. A ‘managed retreat’, in which the dykes disappear and we start living with the tides.
What if we do not see rising sea levels as a threat, but allow the sea, with its water, tides, silt and marine flora and fauna, to help shape our landscape?

For the first part of this research, I want to change perspective. Models with a ratio of, for example, 1:10,000 are placed at the tide line, where soil life, silt and seawater (scale 1:1) can influence the model. An extreme magnification of the sea as a designer of the landscape with enormous creatures and forces shaping it.

By changing scale and perspective I hope to catch a glimpse of a world that is often hidden, but which has an enormous impact on our landscape. By enlarging that world and looking at it from the perspective of water, tides and soil life, I hope to bring people and their environment, the present and future and reality and absurdism closer together.

Official kickoff: March 20, 2020
Exhibition: September 2020

More information about the project on:

Noordenaars – Artist in space

Photos: Hanne van der Velde

From October till December 2019 I did a residency at the Bierumerschool. The residency was called Flux and the total project included also works from other artists. For the residency, I visited many places at the Eems (river) and Dollard (estuary) to study the movement of the water. It resulted in the work Flux – Tracing the fluctuation.

On November 8 2019 I gave a workshop for art teachers organized by Breitner Academie / ArtechLAB. The workshop was based upon the work Attempts to understand a field. Participants all got basic research materials and a handout with different layered ways of looking. They looked for a spot outside to study a 20x20cm area of the terrain. The results were very diverse and interesting.
 Lee Mc Donald also gave a workshop based on his practice.

Photos: Breitner Academie

From November 2019 until March 2020 my work Layers of the past continuous is exhibited in Museum Nienoord in Leek, Groningen. The work is about the natural and cultural history of the landscape and the layers of history that are visible in peat. For the exhibition, a group of contemporary artists gave a reflection upon the history of the Nienoord estate.

Metropolis M placed an article about my work in the Graduation Special 2019.

This summer I showed the work Attempts to understand a field (2019) at the Bierumerschool, a museum and artist residency in the village of Bierum in the North-East of the province of Groningen. My work was shown on the ground floor in an old classroom. Upstairs in the attic, Can Demren and Patrick Hoving showed their work.

artist talk met Cam Demren, Linde Ex en Patrick Hoving from Studio Bierum on Vimeo.

For my graduation, I made a book called Traces. The book describes the way I work, my sources of inspiration and the choices I make as an artist.

You can find a digital version of the book here.