What_We_Build

Opening: Friday, May 24, 18h-21h
Artist talk with iovermorgen and Kari Robertson, Saturday, May 25, 16h
Soil Study Group walk and dinner, Saturday, June 15, 15h-20h
Performance Carnisse in flux and artist talk with Omid Kheirabadi, Saturday, July 13, 16h
Visiting days and hours: Friday, Saturday, 14-18h and by appointment
The exhibition is open until Saturday, July 13.

After more than two years in Bevelandsestraat 10, an other world is leaving the space that has become our home. We are leaving because of the planned demolition of the apartment block, set to take place at the end of 2024. This means that not only the place that housed us will disappear, but also the fibre of the neighbourhood will be changed forever. New, larger apartments will be built on the site where an other world used to stand, while the people who have lived in the area for decades have to find a new home.

What We Build On is the last programme at Bevelandsestraat 10, and consists of Scraps, trash, treasures, a site specific public intervention by the collective iovermorgen, dilated mud a solo exhibition by Kari Robertson, and Carnisse in flux: navigating change through performative speculation a series of workshops and a happening by Omid Kheirabadi. What We Build On explores larger social and environmental materialities that deeply affect our lives as individuals and communities. By observing and responding to our surroundings, the works tackle in different ways issues of gentrification, erasure, and ecology.

Kari Robertsons’ exhibition dilated mud explores the soil of Rotterdam as a shared, highly polluted and toxic substance beneath our feet, which holds within it an archive of human behaviour; from industry to agricultural practices to chemical warfare. Regarded in this way, soil holds our collective memory and if observed closely offers clues for how we might begin to transform and remediate toxic histories and practices. The exhibition draws from the alchemical tradition in which toxicity is less about specific substances and more about concentrations. The most famous line from the foundational, hermetic text The Emerald Tablet is the frequently quoted mistranslation 'as above, so below.' A more accurate translation of the text reads 'the below is of the above, the above is of the below.' This articulates an important shift away from simile, metaphor or comparison and into material entanglement; from transcendence into terrestrial situatedness.

Part of dilated mud, Soil Study Group will host a walk and dinner event on June 15. The (toxic) Soil Study Group was initiated in 2022 with the shared desire to explore and learn ways to relate to the soil. Meeting bi-monthly, the members (a shifting group of students, teachers, graduates and researchers of the Willem de Kooning Academy/ Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam) have expanded what it can be to informally study together. Soil Study Group invites you to join them for an afternoon of walking through the neighbourhood to listen, observe, forage and glean before going to an other world to cook and eat dinner together. Places will be limited, to receive more information or reserve a place please email: karilericher@gmail.com before June 10th. Please also inform us of any special dietary requirements or allergies.

Scraps, trash, treasures is a site specific public intervention on the facade of an other world by artist in residence iovermorgen. The duo will add new layers of neglected materials to the existing facade of an other world’s building allowing a general public to experience an experimental preservation of materials and the building, condemned to demolition. To gather neglected materials for the work, iovermorgen will enter the local underground of resources that exist beneath the available, priced market. Whatever they find; scraps, trash, treasures, will become the palette to imitate the facade and echo the architectural elements of the building. As such, the work can be re-installed, which allows us to hold on to the "facade" after the demolition of the space.

Carnisse in flux: navigating change through performative speculation by Omid Kheirabadi is a workshop series with a group of participants that will analyse and map the changes in the neighbourhood using performative methodologies. The workshop will culminate in a ‘happening’ event during the finissage of What We Build On. Using the happening as a format is directly related to the changes resulting from the gentrification of the neighbourhood. The promise of a cleaner, safer and healthier future neighbourhood is given by the local authorities, but nothing is certain. The happening, a format without a beginning, middle or end, through its openness and fluidity offers a counteraction based on unplanned actions to occur. During the happening an other world will become a stage for this constant change.

Kari Robertson (b.1988 Edinburgh, UK) is a researcher, artist, educator, sometimes writer, and parent based in Rotterdam (NL). She currently teaches in Social Practices at the Willem de Kooning Academy where she is also part of the Promiscuous Care research group. She is also a research fellow in the fellowship for Situated Practices at BAK, Utrecht. Kari convenes the 'Soil Study Group' an informal collective who meet periodically to study the soil of Rotterdam.

Working primarily with time-based media, Kari's practice is engaged with impure and entangled substances and states, which speak as much to toxic histories as to collective becoming. She interrogates the 'myths of separability' that emerge from modernity, and explores notions of ‘toxicity’ and ‘contamination’ within complex natureculture contexts. In recent works Kari has engaged with vital and mutable forms including orchids, rainwater and soil.

iovermorgen /iOM! (DK) is a duo consisting of Anne Bea and Stine Dines whose experimental practice deals with circular architectural projects stretching into the field of art. The point of departure in their projects is existing places and materials approached in favor of prolonging their lives by inscribing them into new narratives and collaborations. They use a former scooter shop in Aarhus as a laboratory for developing an alternative method for a gradual public transformation. iOM! works with recycling and upcycling of used materials. A big part of their practice entails collecting and arranging for used materials to be repurposed. They do so by contacting building sites, entrepreneurs, scrap locations and local initiatives.

Omid Kheirabdi (born 1992 in Tehran) is a visual artist, architect, and performer based in Rotterdam. He decodes late-capitalist societal relationships to comprehend their oppressive mechanisms and their effects on individuals. His works revolve around questions of power, global disparities in economics and legal status, Western (European) hegemony, and labor, with the aim of challenging prevailing narratives. His artistic inspiration stems from his life experiences and political motivations, pursuing the power of art to provoke dialogue. By creating spaces that encourage us to question the systems that shape our lives, his practice foster the exploration of new possibilities for coexistence. One example is his"performance sessions", where people from different backgrounds gather and engage in dialogue to co-create improvised performative compositions based on their personal narratives. Omid has exhibited his work and performances across multiple locations, including Amsterdam, The Hague, Leuven, Zürich, Belfast, Rotterdam, Sierre (CH), and Maastricht.

What We Build On is supported by Gemeente Rotterdam. With contributions supported by CBK Rotterdam (Centre for Visual Arts Rotterdam), The Danish Arts Foundation, and Mondriaan Fonds.

Photos Jake Caleb.

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