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DISTANT SUFFERING portfolio 2026

hans overvliet.com

Cover DISTANT SUFFERING LIV | i.d. of a burned future

Leiden 1959 | Gaza 2023 - 2025

I think the kids are in trouble Do not know what all the troubles are for The National | Conversation 16 | 2011

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. Samuel Beckett | Worstward Ho | 1983

What’s the best thing that ever happened to you? my mind asked me long ago. I said, learning that you are not me. Andrea Gibson (1975 –2025) The mind is a cage. Here's the key | 2015

hans overvliet studio-address | Dreesstraat 2 Vlissingen www.hansovervliet.com curiositas@zeelandnet.nl guardian of www.caesuur.nu team member of www.ikbeneengod.one supporter of www.ikgeefjemijnraam.nl click here for my C.V. International reference | DutchCulture

DISTANT SUFFERING portfolio / current state of affairs the project DISTANT SUFFERING

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works | autonomous works | community

page 07 page 59

selection exhibitions

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sizes / materials artworks

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acknowledgement

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From the start of the art project in 2014, the text has been a substantial part of my work. It should be noted however that the text never explains the work. It touches a differ-rent category of layering; it speaks to an-other part of the mind. Here you find a selection.

DISTANT SUFFERING

the project page 4

Since 2013, by means of the ongoing art-series DISTANT SUFFERING*, the Dutch artist Hans Overvliet (Leiden, 1952) investigates the role of the media in their representation of (military) violence. This, in the context of themes as perception, memory and identity formation. Overvliet uses a various range of media, symbols and codes, bringing together dichotomies like beauty and violence, refinement and brutality, the sublime and the vulgar. As a reporter, Overvliet was an eyewitness to the events in the Middle East during the mid-1980s. Of course, these experiences resonate in this body of work. So, aspects of power, politics, exclusion, censorship and the connection be-tween artist, artwork and viewer infiltrate his multifaceted conceptual oeuvre. Martha Jager, curator Vleeshal in Middelburg about the oeuvre: The dedication to art as a relational verb is central to Overvliet's work. On the one hand, the balance between poetry and criti-cism is special, so that the work never becomes bit- ter or pedantic, while at the same time the dia-logue with the viewer is actively maintained. It is a tender form of activism that moves and urges acti-on and also continuously questions the role of art.

Elements of DISTANT SUFFERING were exhibited in the Netherlands, Belgium, Pakistan, the U.S.A., England, France, Italy, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Albania, Germany, Lebanon, Brazil, Argentina and Sweden. In 2023, his whole body of paper collages ( 1999 – 2012 ) joined Geert & Carla Verbeke’s renowned collection of collages and assemblages. In 2024 - 2025 the complete oeuvre of DISTANT SUFFERING was exhibited in the museum part of the Verbeke Foundation. All the art works were then included in the permanent collection. Next to his artwork Hans is, together with his wife Willy van Houtum, the founder and guardian of the space for contemporary art: ruimteCAESUUR for the last 31-years.

*The title of this work in progress refers to the book with the same titel by Luc Boltanski—who is, indeed, the brother of the artist Christian Boltanski. Luc Boltanski argues that spectators can actively engage with distant suffering, and in doing so, involve others by speaking about what they have witnessed and how they were affected by it.

DISTANT SUFFERING

works | autonomous

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DISTANT SUFFERING I | syrian skies 1,000 days

2014 Spectacular infernos and plumes of smoke rising above a city skyline. Every day, countless images of this kind reach our are ever-present screens in HD or 4K. The actual consequences—the deaths, the mutilations, and the terror unfolding beneath those plumes of smoke—remain, quite literally, invisible and out of frame. I address this ‘near-being absent’ through aestheticization and extreme softening of the cropped analogue newspaper image . . .

Work 12 prints A4 on 10 mm. foam board.

Ariha | 07-09-2013

DISTANT SUFFERING II

anatomy of a cloud [ gaza ] | 2014

The media fragment war reporting into a series of isolated, disconnected events—devoid of any explanation of the deeper historical, political, or social context— spread across an endless array of channels, platforms, and individual sources of information. According to the French sociologist and philosopher Jean Baudrillard, this atomization does not represent an actual physical struggle; rather, it creates a splintered media spectacle that replaces true reality with a hyperreality. In his essays collected in The Gulf War Did Not Take Place (1991), he analyses how the media transform the conflict, with fragmentation playing a key role in this process. Although Baudrillard developed his theory during the era of traditional television broadcasting, his concept is more relevant today than ever. In our current digital age—encompassing platforms such as Facebook, Telegram, TikTok, and X—they shape our perception, while the material reality of the war vanishes definitively behind the screen. Work 5 full colour prints; each 82,2 x 12,8 cm; mounted on 10 mm. foam board.

DISTANT SUFFERING III | i.d. of recovery

Kintsugi is a Japanese art form in which broken pottery is transformed using lacquer mixed with gold, silver, or platinum powder. The concept behind kintsugi is to highlight the cracks and fractures in the pottery rather than concealing them. It serves as a metaphor for the acceptance of imperfections—embodying wabi-sabi, a Japanese philosophy that values the beauty of imperfection, transience, and incompleteness. This aligns seamlessly with my personal and artistic motto, borrowed from Samuel Beckett—Fail better— taken from his prose piece Worstward Ho (1983): All of old. Nothing else ever. Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. Click here for the video.

Work 2 platters Ø 45 cm; video with the crushing platter.

videolink

DISTANT SUFFERING IV

documentation of a cloud - 2015 Six photographers, each representing a different international press agency, take up positions on a hill near the Mürşitpınar border crossing in Turkey—a vantage point overlooking the Kurdish / Syrian town of Ain al-Arab, just a short distance away. And so, they wait. The Syrian government has announced that it will carry out a bombardment that evening on Ain al-Arab. That is what they are waiting for. Then, late that night, the first strike hits. The six photographers trigger their shutters. Back at the hotel, over a good meal, they share their images, ensuring that each press agency receives a slightly different shot. However, because all the photographers used ultra-long lenses, the angle of every single photograph remains more or less the same . . . At every exhibition, I invited the press to write about my disregard for the copyright on the photographs, hoping that one of the press agencies would sue me. in this instance too, the victims of the bombing have received no compensation. Meanwhile, the press agencies continue to profit from the suffering of the local inhabitants of Ain al- Arab Click here for the catalogue. Work 7 x [ 8,2 x 12,8 cm] full colour prints

photo | Bulent Kilic | AFP Photo

photo | Gokhan Sahin | Getty Images

photo | Lefteris Pitarakis | AP Photo

DISTANT SUFFERING VI | i.d. of a shared key

2015 Palestinian refugees whom I met from the early eighties to the present day keep up the keys of their homes from which they were expelled from 1948 on by the state of Israel. The current generation Palestinians carries all kinds of keys and key chains as jewellery. In 1991, for the first time I read the book Pity the Nation, Lebanon at War by Robert Fisk*. The moving chapter The Keys of Palestine** associating me with my own experiences on the West-Bank, Gaza and Lebanon. Click here for the catalogue.

Pity the Nation | Robert Fisk Oxford Paperbacks ISBN 978-0-19-280130-2 | 1990 Here this chapter can be read

Work 215 old, cleaned tin cans with an imprint of a key from a hotel near Crestet, France that no longer exists.

photo courtesey of ©Jorieke Rotier Verbeke FoundationBelgium | November 2025

DISTANT SUFFERING VII - VIII – IX

i.d. of a shared cloud / wave / home - 2015 Since time immemorial, humans have migrated across the entire planet. Sometimes groups set off under duress; at other times, they are deported en masse, follow trade routes, or find local economic conditions untenable. The 3,000 images in this work bear witness to the contemporary causes of migration: war, environmental impacts—in short, the destruction of habitat. The work thus aims to serve as a reflection on the ‘nomadic’—in the Deleuzian sense of the term. I share his view that the mobility of this nomad lies primarily in the dynamics of becoming, rather than in the static development of being. In short: in the act of making a difference. It is a dynamic difference that rigid host cultures often struggle to accommodate. Work

Click here for the catalogue.

3 ‘out-lines’ of filing cabinets each 134 cm x 49,5 cm x 71 cm [h x w x d] Filled with 1,000 images of explosions 1,000 images of waves 1,000 images of destroyed houses

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXVII

i.d. of a shared history of mobility I have transformed the space of Bewaerschole into a saltwater pond of 10 cm deep, that covers the entire floor surface. In it stands an ‘out-line’ filing cabinet filled with 1,280 images of waves on 64 sheets with waves super imposed with statistics on Global Warming. At an irregular interval you can hear The National with Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks: Leave your home, change your name, live alone . . . Click here for the catalogue; Click here for the video.

DISTANT SUFFERING XXI

i.d. a shared bullet | work in progress - 2020

When I take a seat in Hans Overvliet's studio, I receive the multiple I.D of a shared bullet. This bullet formed of ice, trapped in a small glass container, is the first exchange between me and Hans and emphasizes the active relationship between maker and receiver that is central to his practice. The melting bullet in my hand questions my position. Poetic but critical, this question continues, even when the bullet, now melted into a layer of water, stands between the art books in my cupboard where it slowly dissolves into nothingness and thus escapes being reduced to an art object. Martha Jager, curator Vleeshal | January 2023

Work Ice bullets mimicking a Kalashnikov AK-47 bullet in small glass bottles with corks. Youtube video timelaps with the melting bullet catalogue

Luxfer Open Space | 2021 Česká SkaliceCzech Republic

Juxtapose Art Fair | 2021 AarhusDenmark

Supermarket Art Fair | 2022 StockholmSweden

Cultuurcentrum Brugge 2022 | BruggeBelgium

Slipvillan | 2022 StockholmSweden

bahnhof25 | 2023 KleveGermany

Verbeke Foundation | 2024 Kemzeke Belgium

Cultuurcentrum Brugge 2022 | BruggeBelgium

Open Nights festival | 2025 LarissaGreece

plan-d | 2026 DüsseldorfGermany

DISTANT SUFFERING XVIII

defacing palestine | the nakba 1948 - 2018 I have mapped 417 Palestinian villages and towns that were destroyed by Israel in 1948. I recorded their names—in both Latin and Arabic script— along with their geographical locations, their population counts in 1948, and a photograph of the remains of each village or town. I compiled this information into 417 obituaries, which I then placed inside a steel filing cabinet. To complete the installation, I made two videos. One of my computer screen, which shows all the true actions that led to each individual obituary. The second video shows the images of the remains of each village or town used in the obituaries. Click here for the video of the making of; Click here for the video with the 147 vanished villages / towns

Work 417 obituaries 19,1 x 14,7 cm in a metal archive box with drawer Laptop | monitor and 2 consoles

DISTANT SUFFERING XXB

i.d. of a shared game set – 2021 Every visual artist dreams, at some point, creating his / hers own Icarus. This is my contribution in that respect to art history: ruins intended for children, surrounded by a mist of white bird’s feathers. Did someone in China get the idea that miniature railway yards required some degree of realism?

Work 1:144 3D Battle Damaged Building in bleached bird feathers Plexiglass hood | 25 x 25 x 25 cm

DISTANT SUFFERING XXC

i.d. of a shared cup of tea - 2021 Populist politicians and critics often dismissively refer to the left's preference for drinking tea with terrorists in their calls for the use of military violence against perceived threats to the Western way of life. This discourse plays an important role in the current conflict in Yemen. This war has taken the lives of tens of thousands of civilian victims, almost all of whom remain anonymous in media and official reports. Finding who exactly are the victims of the war in Yemen is a hell of a journey. Most often you will find groups: unnamed families, wedding guests and / or funeral attendants, (young) children, half the village, etc., etc. From the Black Sea, the Mediterranean, the Caspian Sea to the Gulf of Aden, all cultures there have a few things in common. One of these is the mandatory drinking of a glass of tea on every occasion as a sign of intrinsic contact. Similarly in Yemen. I took my memories on those many cups of tea that I was invited to drink there as the starting point to set up a monument to give all victims a name and an identity: i.d. of a shared cup of tea is a monument for the 14-year-old Raja Hamid Yahya al-Oud from Sa’na, murdered by Saudi Arabia on March 23, 2018 in Sa'dah by a CBU-52 B/B cluster bomb. Click here for the catalogue Work tea glass | sand from Zeeland, Yemen and America; engraved brass plate 95 x 50 mm; Plexiglass hood | 25 x 25 x 25 [ x o,3 ] cm; Console | 110 x 25 x 25 cm. MDF 9 mm.

DISTANT SUFFERING XXE | i.d. of liquid mobility - 2021

Every day updating the necessary elements for building your identity is central in what is your design of your life. So, you find yourself in the midst of the pushing aspect of liquid modernity1 as described by Zygmunt Bauman. A liquidity that can be described as infinitely mobile in which everyone and everything has become a 'product' and everything and everyone competes with each other for the right to exist. Nowhere do these elements come together more clearly than in the phenomenon of tourism: creating memories in distant, exotic—and outside the resort sometimes perceived dangerous—places, then sharing everything on social media while craving likes, shares, and comments. As for these tourist flows: Baudrillard (with M. Nio in The Fatal Strategies, 2002) taught me: We live in the age of hyperreality, in a multimedia consumer society in which images and objects lead a life of their own. Thát reality has nothing to do with reality. It is a collage-like video clip; we live in a spectacle society. We don't buy things because we need them, but because of the make-believe world they evoke in us. In this context the tourist in addition to environmental and cultural damage, yields only a total empty nullité ( zeroness ). Click here for the catalogue Work two Dutch newspapers [ NRC / VK ] two Faller rowing boats blue, Artitec approximately 50 x 33 cm.

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXI other than joyful peace, no news from the Western Front December 22, 2022 – February 24, 2023 50 pictures of skies in Zeeland in solidarity with Oleg K. and his family in Kiev - Ukraine

Click here for the catalogue.

DISTANT SUFFERING LIV | i.d. of a burned future

Leiden 1959 | Gaza 2023 - 2025 Israel’s genocidal army is not only murdering tens of thousands of children, women, and men; alongside these war crimes, the material and intangible culture of the Palestinians is also being erased. A fitting metaphor and analogy for this is the destruction of the centuries-old soap industry in Nablus—one of whose workshops I had the privilege of visiting in 1985. I associate that loss with the enduring, vibrant existence of Pieter de la Courtsraat 67 in Leiden—a positively emotionally charged place that holds so many fond memories for me. Click here for the catalogue

Work 10 black and white photoprints from our family archive; Nablus soap from the Nablus Soap Company.

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXXVII | i.d. of an encased bullet

performance | multiple Zeeuwse Art Fair Pop-up the Machine Vlissingen | October 25 and 26, 2024

Work bullets, casted with white porcelain plaster in a wooden box | red velvet. All proceeds went to the Hope Foundation

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXX

i.d. of an artist's video portrait | 2024 utterly endlessly repurposed naive incantation gesture Bullets, primarily designed to kill and wound, also in this artwork are completely transformed from destructive into harmless objects. Bullets from brittle porcelain gypsum completely undermine their destructive potential. This verwandeln of the destructive element of the bullet into something aesthetically pleasing, results in an unjustified sense of harmlessness. At the same time, by casting a number of these bullets every day – like a medieval incantation - I hoped, compulsively that the people I know, including many people I can call my friends, in Ukraine, Gaza, Yemen, the West-Bank, Israel, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, etc. would stay alive. Thus, the work and its possible purpose legitimised itself within itself. Alas: against my better judgment because we lost many a friend . . .

Work the video by Hans Overvliet & Jochem Weststrate

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXXVI

i.d. of the shared tale of a bullet 2025 White porcelain bullets from the project DISTANT SUFFERING XXXX | i.d. of an artist's video portrait have been incorporated into this artwork.

Work frame with perforated sheets filled with 1,200 bullets casted with porcelain plaster; monitor with video DISTANT SUFFERING XXXX

DISTANT SUFFERING LI | i.d. of a lethal clinique

Colmar | Deir al-Balah Triptych | 2025 And if the Americans could bomb a hospital in Serbia or a civilian housing estate in Baghdad, who were the hypocritical West to object when the Israeli army slaughtered the innocents of Lebanon and Gaza in identical ways? Robert Fisk | 1946 – 2020 Dedicated to Sha’ban al-Dalou, burned alive by an Israeli / American AGM-114 Hellfire rocket in Deir al Balah on Monday, October 14, 2024 at about one o’clock at night. Click here for the catalogue

Work intravenous (IV) equipment from own operation folding mattress BASIC F15 | JYSK; three plexiglas cubes

DISTANT SUFFERING LVI | i.d. of shared betrayal

Somewhere in Gaza. A man, crouching, scrapes the last grains of rice from the sand. Beside him, another man— engaged in the same pursuit: feeding his family. Beside him, another man. Much like my grandfather during the Hunger Winter of 1945. Never again—that was his credo. Never again. How we betrayed my grandfather—in violation of all the international legislation that had been established from 1948 on. Click here for a short video-introduction; click here for the catalogue. Work

cotton pouches with Riso Carnaroli di LucedioIT; video, courtesy by ©Myuz AhmedGAZA, 27/07/’2; sound of an Israeli drone; 24” TV- Samsung with Stereo Soundbar; brown paper bag; Monzana Storage Rack Bookcase.

DISTANT SUFFERING LVIII

identification of a deadly pattern Emmanuel Levinas (1906 – 1995) identifies the personal encounter with another human being – the Other – as the fundamental experience of ethical responsibility. This approach is at the heart of Levinas' philosophy. In his work, he focuses on what he calls the face à face encounter with the Other, an experience in which an individual, a human being, becomes aware of the mortality and vulnerability of the Other. In his view, avoiding the gaze of one's fellow human beings is the beginning of all violence. It is from this perspective that I want to look into the eyes of those murdered by the army of the apartheid state of Israel with this work. They were all Others. Others I did not know, but who nevertheless wanted to inform me, despite all the dangers, of the genocide they were in the midst of and ultimately became victims of themselves. They took photographs, made videos and sound recordings, edited, assisted, blogged, posted on Facebook, Insta, X, you name it. As eyewitnesses, they merely recorded the horrors. And while they did so, most of them looked me straight in the eye, face to face, until they were forcibly stopped from being the Other. Click here for a short introduction, here for the video with the journalists, here for the German version video with the postcards Work Three monitors Multiplex board Two photo albums | Budu Book Holder

DISTANT SUFFERING LXVI | i.d. of a lamented rug

Somewhere in my head, the potholes in the sand on the beach where I’m standing, connects with the beach in Gaza where I so often enjoyed myself after a day's work. Seconds later, I realize that that same sand is going to conceal the war crimes committed by Israel. These thoughts and feelings converge at the carpet I saw being swept clean of sand and dust with a reed broom in Intifada 1985 in a West-Bank Palestinian refugee camp – Daheisha – established by UNWRA in 1949. A split second later, I am back in the Khan Younis refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, established a year earlier in 1948. My memories connect with images from a documentary I saw two days earlier. The same kind of broom, the same kind of woman, the same kind of carpet, the same inhumane conditions. A freshly swept carpet. Without sand. For children to play on, as a sign of dignity, of domesticity, of personal and shared customs; a sign of a warm welcome. But in Gaza it is also the metaphor of sweeping genocide under the carpet. Sweeping extermination under the carpet. The work also plays with Orientalism: the stereotypical Western way of viewing and depicting the Orient (the Middle East and North Africa). Exoticism and the flying carpet are inextricably linked as symbols of the Western fascination with the perceived mysterious and magical East. Click here for the catalogue. Work Eight landscapes ±50 x ±31 x ±7 cm; Mini rugs | from the Wooden Dollhouse; Papier-mâché; Sand from Zeeland.

DISTANT SUFFERING LXV

i.d. of a liminal banner Central to this artwork is the concept of liminal: the threshold space between two states, in which existing structures lose their self-evidence, but a new reality has not yet fully formed. With the iconic central image of the work – the bullet – a historical connection is established between the industrialization of physical violence since the First World War and the conceptual violence of the current algorithmization of power. Whereas violence was organized in the past via industrial, material and physical systems, it is now a days mostly carried out and mediated by digital infrastructures, data, and algorithms. We find ourselves at the intersection of the process from visibility to invisibility, of real to fake, from being visibly present to disappearing silently; at the intersection of object and the immaterial attitude-based concept. My intention with this piece is that one's time-space continuum dissolves for a moment - that one loses the familiar frame of reference and is absorbed into a paradoxical reality, in which the external threat and the poetry from within are simultaneously present. Click here for the catalogue Work 45 unbleached canvas 270 g/m², 60 cm x 160 cm before washing; printed with Jacquard Set Cyanotype; some faded / softened. Total dimensions (…) on a personal note: Hight, measured from the floor: 220 cm; The work the190 process Lengtalso 480shows cm; With cm of a 74-year-old artist, whose body is slowly but steadily falling apart and who

DISTANT SUFFERING

works | community

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DISTANT SUFFERING | kites sharing the sky

2018 Work 20 kites Ø 106 cm, made out of artisan (Washi), made in Japan: Inshu Kozo, 56 grams, color white. The gross size of the sent sheet is 98 by 98 cm; Participating artists from Pakistan | Mehreen Hashmi from Gaza / Palestine | Mohammed alHawajri, Dina Mattar and Raed Issa from Germany / Danmark | Jörn Burmester from Belgium | jen gossé, Frie J. Jacobs and Jan Verhaeghe from the Netherlands | Leni van den Berge, Ko de Jonge, Dani Ploeger, leon riekwell, Loek Grootjans, Ingrid Rollema, Hans Overvliet, Stef Fridael, Robin Weijers, Harriët Rademakers and Rinus Roepman Click here for the catalogue of the project & exhibition. Click here for the (partly Dutch) catalogue with the international political uproar.

Image: expo in Beirut, Lebanon in 2022

DISTANT SUFFERING XXII | i.d. of inequality

2020 In our globalized world, there are many political contradicttions: rich vs poor, white vs black, north vs south, et cetera. In recent years you have also seen this contradiction increasingly clearly expressed in mobility. This mobility contrasts sharply with the necessary escape from war and poverty of migrants. There is no warm welcome for them, as western people can expect everywhere. No infrastructure in which they feel safe, no tax benefits, but countless dangers and hardships and hopeless admission criteria. In short, mobility is currently one of the clearest examples of privilege. The poster shows one of the few similarities between these different travellers, namely their luggage. The poignant differrence is in the contents of these suitcases, bags and backpacks. I have snale-mailed this poster to colleagues and fellow institutions all over the world. Click here for the catalogue in the making. Work 200 full colour posters A1 [ 59,4 x 84 cm. ] qr-code linking to the main text on 135 gr. MC paper with the paraphernalia of ‘travelling / mobility’, placed in public spaces all over the world and a catalogue / book in the making, following the process participation on this moment more than 142 participants from over 60 countries

DISTANT SUFFERING

selection exhibitions / activities acknowledgement

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Municipality of Middelburg | Hallways, a study / images of 120 corridors and halls in private homes and (semi-) government buildings in Middelburg. Vlissingen | LOOKING THROUGH THE EYE OF W. I give you my window in conjunction with the Film Festival Film by the Sea | curator Sylvia Hubrouck 2023 StockholmSweden | Slipvillan | Curator team Studio44 Dishoek - Bunker WWII | curator leon riekwell KemzekeBelgium | Verbeke Foundation all paper collages 1999 -2012 are included in the collection of collages and assemblages by Geert and Carla Verbeke-Lens AarhusDenmark | Juxtapose Art Fair | Curated by Cecilie Bernts, Pamela Grombacher, Sasha Rose Richter and Jacob Juhl StockholmSweden | Längholmen | KEEP ON BREATHING Curator Masoud Shahsavari Los AngelesU.S.A. | Gallery Durden and Ray Curated by Carlos Beltran Arechiga Germany Kleve | kunstverein bahnhof24 2022 LahorePakistan | In the glare of grey moon | Ranrez art gallery Curator Mehreen Hashmi BruggesBelgium | Expect an Occasional Attack … and Flee CultuurCentrum Brugge | Curator Jan Verhaeghe PragueCzech Republic | LIPA art collection Peace letters to Ukrain #2Germany [ no. 38 – video i.d. of a shared bullet ]

2022 | continuation BeirutLebanon | Kite project as part of the exhibition Salute to the Prisoners of Freedom | Art Exhibition at Institute for Palestinian Studies | Curator Sebastian BernburgU.K StockholmSweden | i.d. of a shared bullet Supermarket Independent Art Fair curator Alice Máselníková, Creative Director StockholmSweden | part of the summer exhibition in Slipvillan Curator team Studio44 Česká SkaliceCzech Republic | Luxfer Open Space part of the presentation of the Lípa Art Collection Curator/collector Roel van der Linden TiranaAlbania | part of the (first) Tirana Biennial of Graphic Arts first edition | Art Gallery of Tirana curators Beste GürsuTurkey, Helidon HalitiAlbania, Zake PrelvukajKosovo 2021 – 2022 StockholmSweden | Studio44 | Curator Rikard Fåhraeus 2021 Česká SkaliceCzech Republic | Luxfer Open Space | residency AarhusDenmark | Juxtapose Art Fair Curator Sasha Rose Richter 2020 Milan | MEN OF (street art) | Independent Artists Curator Martina Buttiglieri Tilburg | Steal like an Artist! | Kunstpodium ‘T’ Curated by Lost Painters | Niek Hendrix Italy

1999 – 2014 | continuation VERDER TERUG | Trechter 5, Goes | 2002 Koetshuis van de Groep Planning, BruggeBelgium Brughes Cultural Capital Europe | solo | 2002 RAAMWERK | OostendeBelgium | solo | 2001 ENGAGÉ! - West-VlaanderenBelgium, Zeeland, Nord-Pas de CalaisFrance | solo | 2000 Galerij Germinahof | Sterksel | 2000 | duo Presentatieruimte De Overslag | Eindhoven | solo | 1999 Financial support Mondrian Fund SBKM / Vleeshal Middelburg Frits Lensvelt Stichting KulturrådetSweden Region StockholmSweden Awards, residencies, commissions and public collections Awards, residencies, commissions and public collections Winner Global Arts Award 2020 from Red Line Art Works, a UK-based global arts project, category art series Sea foundation | Tilburg | residence Sanders Geluk / Kunstsuper Rotterdam | residency Public spaces in Axel and Neeltje Jans Work in (private) collections, Independent ArtistsItaly, Ramírez Art GalleryPakistan, Visione Altre Galleria VeniceItaly, Karpuchina GalleryCzech Republic, Verbeke Foundation, KemzekeBelgium, The Institute for Palestine StudiesLebanon | Palestine | London | Washington, LIPACzech Republi,

Art-related activities Hans Overvliet as part of his art praxis Communication support I give you my window 2023 2015 - 2021 Co-initiator of Association Art House Zeeland, platform for artists 2012 - 2026 Co-creator / co-curator Kunstpark Vlissingen / Landscape Art Park Vlissingen 2009 - 2019 Chairman Foundation Studio Complex KipVis 2009 - 2014 Chairman Foundation decreet / concrete, 2005 - 2012 Chairman PLUS MIN Foundation, Renesse, succeeded by IK Foundation, Vlissingen Founder, curator and co-director of 1995 Art Space ruimteCAESUUR 1995 Curator / art educational projects / advising

hans overvliet +31 6 282 77 052 www.hansovervliet.com curiositas@zeelandnet.nl

DISTANT SUFFERING

sizes / materials works

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DISTANT SUFFERING I | syrian skies 1,000 days

12 prints A4; of photos from the Dutch daily de Volkskrant of 23/12/’13; Canon MP-101 matt photo paper 170 grams, Canon Pixma MG6150 printer; on 10 mm. foam board. DISTANT SUFFERING II | anatomy of a cloud [ gaza ]

5 full colour prints on Hahnemüle German Etching 310 grs.; each 82,2 x 12,8 cm mounted on 10 mm. foam board. Photo Gaza, Beit Hanoun, 13 August 2014. Unknown photographer DISTANT SUFFERING III | i.d. of recovery

2 platters Ø 45 cm; video with the crushing platter. DISTANT SUFFERING IV | documentation of a cloud

5 x [ 8,2 x 12,8 cm ] full colour prints on Hahnemüle German Etching 310 grs. mounted on 10 mm. Kapafix; the Syrische town Kobane / Ain al-Arab, observed from the Turkish village Mursitpinar / Mürşitpınar [ 36° 54' 14" North, 38° 20' 52" East ] in the Sanliurfa region Monday, October 20, 2014

DISTANT SUFFERING VI | i.d. of a shared key

215 old, cleaned tin cans with an imprint of a key, pressed into plaster in the shape of a gold bar. DISTANT SUFFERING VII - VIII – IX

i.d. of a shared cloud / wave / home 3 ‘out-lines’ of filing cabinets each 134 cm x 49,5 cm x 71 cm [h x w x d] from weathering steel 2x [ 10 x 10 mm] 1x [12 x 12 mm], wooden bars 1 x 1 cm; Nobo OHP Transparency Film, sided acid-free tape. Filled with 1,000 images of explosions and ‘holiday clouds’ on 50 sheets with codes super imposed on the images: unique location positioning from a military open-source website; 1,000 images of waves with Statistics Global Warming on 50 sheets; 1,000 images of destroyed houses With ground plans in the images send to me - in 1996 on my request from and of 72 national libraries The World Library Art Project on 50 sheets.

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXVII

i.d. of a shared history of mobility I have transformed the space of Bewaerschole into a pond of 10 cm deep, filled with sand and salt water that covers the entire floor surface. In it stands an ‘out-line’ filing cabinet 134 cm x 49,5 cm x 71 cm. [ h x w x d ]; weathering steel [ 10 x 10 mm]; wooden bars 1 x 1 cm; Nobo OHP Transparency Film; Inkjet prints with Canon TS705, sided acid-free tape; filled with 1,280 images of waves on 64 sheets statistics Global Warming; music quotation The National | Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks | 2010. Leave your home, change your name, live alone . . . curator for Bewaerschole | Geeske Pluijmers financial support | Mondriaan Fonds DISTANT SUFFERING XXI

i.d. a shared bullet | work in progress Mold ‘hot Bullet Shape Mode’ from Etsy, Hong Kong mimicking a Kalashnikov AK-47 cartridge; Small bottles from Etsy, Hong Kong and corks, volume: 85 oz (25ml), 90 mm x 20 mm; Severin GB 8882 - Mini freezer; Steel console 110 x 60 x 60 cm, powder coated white; Tap water from the countries where the multiple was presented.

DISTANT SUFFERING XVIII

defacing palestine | the nakba 1948 - 2018 417 obituaries | 19, 1 x 14,7 cm [ l., w. ] black & white prints with 5% extra cyan on Staples inkjet printer paper, 170 g/m2, matt by Canon PIXMA IMAX651 in a metal archive box with drawer brand / production year unknown 39,7 x 19,8 x 15,3 cm [ l., w., h. ]; laptop Samsung notebook NP.R530 with a video of the making process; monitor with video with pictures of the 147 spots; 2 consoles | MDF 18 mm. | Flexa white primer Flexa white satin gloss; for metal archive box: 90 x 28 x 60 cm [ h., w., l. ]; for laptop 90 x 36 x 23,3 cm [ h., w., l. ]. DISTANT SUFFERING XXB | i.d. of a shared game set

1:144 3D Battle Damaged Building Outland Model Railway Office Scene for Child Gift Hand Work Plastic ABS Assemble Game Set Bleached bird feathers Plexiglass hood | 25 x 25 x 25 [ x o,3 ] cm Console | 30 x 25 x 2,5 cm MDF 9 mm primer white / topcoat Gamma white 710 – matt

DISTANT SUFFERING XXC

i.d. of a shared cup of tea tea glass | Loctite Super Glue Glas; sand from Zeeland, Yemen and America; engraved brass plate 95 x 50 mm; Plexiglass hood | 25 x 25 x 25 [ x o,3 ] cm; Console | 110 x 25 x 25 cm. MDF 9 mm; primer white / topcoat Gamma white 710 – matt text brass engraved text In memory of Raja Hamid Yahya al-Oud [14] † 23 March 2018 | Sa'dah – Yemen Raja was it by a CBU-52 B/B cluster bomb, manufactured in 1977 in Jackson, West Tennessee, U.S.A. DISTANT SUFFERING XXE | i.d. of liquid mobility - 2021

two Dutch newspapers [ NRC / VK ]; wallpaper paste Perfix non-woven | paint: Histor black 6372 – matt; two Faller rowing boats blue, Artitec H0 Steel A387.09-BL approximately 50 x 33 cm. on four threaded rods | Ø 5 mm

DISTANT SUFFERING XXXXVII

i.d. of an encased bullet performance | multiple | October 25 and 26, 2024 Zeeuwse Art Fair Pop-up the Machine bullets, 113 mm x 15 mm Ø; casted with white porcelain plaster; in a wooden box - 17 x 5,7 x 5 cm - with brass closure; 2024 | edition I | 60 | 9 A.P.; red velvet. 2025 | (special) edition II | 10 | 3 A.P.; berlin blue velvet All proceeds went to the Hope Foundation DISTANT SUFFERING XXXX

i.d. of an artist's video portrait | 2024 utterly endlessly repurposed naive incantation gesture video | co-production Hans Overvliet & Jochem Weststrate the video DISTANT SUFFERING XXXXVI

i.d. of the shared tale of a bullet frame (120 x 180 cm); with 8 perforated sheets (40 x 60 cm); each with 150 holes; filled with 1,200 bullets (113 mm x 15 mm Ø); casted with white porcelain plaster. Monitor with video DISTANT SUFFERING XXXX

DISTANT SUFFERING LIV | i.d. of a burned future

Leiden 1959 | Gaza 2023 - 2025 10 black and white prints from our family archive; 9 x 14 cm | 300 grs Plano; plexiglas cube 30 x 30 x 30 cm; wooden console | 30 x 30 x 20 cm | matte white. Nablus soap, Zepig from the Nablus Soap Company. Photo | Left to right Leiden, 1959 | Wil FreekePieter de la Courtstraat 67 grandparents back garden. niece Annemieke Freeke, me and my brother Marten. DISTANT SUFFERING LI | i.d. of a lethal cliniq

Colmar | Deir al-Balah | Triptych | 2025 Intravenous (IV) equipment from one's own surgery/operation; folding mattress BASIC F15 | JYSK; three plexiglas cubes 35 x 35 x 35 cm; wooden console 110 x 105 x 35 painted matte white.

DISTANT SUFFERING LVI | i.d. of shared betrayal

cotton pouches with bullet holes caused by air pistol Webly Tempest 4,5 mm, nr. 221796, Webly&Scott LTD; Shagai Parboil rice, mixed with Riz noir interdit, Maison Sabarot; Riso Carnaroli di LucedioIT; video, courtesy by ©Myuz AhmedGAZA, July 27, 2025, Gaza Strip; sound of an Israelian drone; 24” TV- Samsung LF22T450FQUX | Speedlink BRIO Stereo Soundbar; brown paper bag from bakehouse ’t Zand; Monzana Storage Rack Bookcase, 5 Shelves, 135,5 x 58 x 27 cm; Click here for a short video-introduction; Click here for the catalogue

DISTANT SUFFERING LVIII

identification of a deadly pattern Two videos (one of which is mirrored horizontally at 1800) with photos of 186 media professionals who were murdered by the Israeli army between October 7, 2023, and September 14, 2025; Video with 186 postcards of places my dear Willy and I visited in Europe while thinking of those placesand those people – German version; Three monitors Iiyama Prolite E2273HDS | 50.5 x 32.0 cm Three Mini HD Media Player - afinjo.nl; Multiplex board 150 x 60 cm black satin gloss RAL 9005; 186 Postcards on 300 gsm paper; Prints by De Witte Print & Design; Handi Stitch Classic pinking shears 4 teeth - 2 mm high. / 18 mm wide; Two photo albums (280 mm x 265 mm x 50 mm) blind-stamped title on front cover and Two boxes for photo albums | title blind-stamped on the side Bookbinder De Boeckenherrebergh Ruth Bonnewel; Budu Book Holder | black | 33 x 24 x 6.2 cm. Click here for the catalogue of an earlier version, included in the Verbeke Foundation collection. Ilja Tuning from Omroep Zeeland made a news item about this first version.

DISTANT SUFFERING LXV | i.d. of a liminal banner

Liminal The concept derives from the Latin words limen, which means threshold. Also from limes, meaning border or border path. The French anthropologist Arnold van Gennep introduced the term in his work Les Rites de Passage (1909). It describes in-between moments, spaces, or feelings where you have left one phase behind but haven't fully entered the next one yet or of a stimulus just strong enough to be consciously experienced. Cloths 45 unbleached canvas 270 g/m², 60 cm x 160 cm \printed with Jacquard Set two for Cyanotype. Some faded / softened by means of a washing process with varying concentrations of washing powder. Pergola 13 Garden post square pine wood 240 x 6.8 x 6.8 x 240 cm; 4 Garden plank pine wood 240 x 1.9 x 9.8 cm; 12 Reinforcements pieces 6.8 x 6.8 x 60 cm | 45°; 4 Post connector corner piece 3-sided | 7 x 7 cm; 2 Post connector T-connector 3-sided | 7 x 7 cm; Wood bolt screws 5 cm; Total dimensions Hight, measured from the floor: 220 cm; Length 480 cm; with 190 cm.

DISTANT SUFFERING

acknowledgement

page 83

A long-term project like DISTANT SUFFERING is impossible to work out on your own. Apart from all the people living in my library, I also want to thank the people who made the execution and exhibitions possible: Willy van Houtum, Giel Louws, Dani Ploeger, Jorieke Rottier, Peter Steutel, Loek Overvliet, Ingrid Rollema, Robbert Jan Swiers, Rinus Roepman, Jan VerhaegheBE, Chris GreenwoodGB, Suzanne GroothuisBelgium, Alina AchenbachLB/DE, Ruben & Anne HordijkBRD, leon riekwell, Loek Grootjans, Hendrik Driessen, Harmen Eijsenga († 2017), jen & Frie GosséBE, Maarten van ’t Hof, Johan de Koning, Leni van den Berge, Ramon de Nennie († 2024), Manuel ZoiaIT, Fred van den Berge († 2017), Martina ButtiglieriIT, Fiek Smitskamp, Frank ÅsnesNO, Rolf van der Mije, Ko de Jonge, Luuk Vulders, Niek Hendriks, Mehreen HashmiPK, Klio KrajewskaGB, Stef Fridael, Mohammed Al jawariGaza, Jacob JühlDK, Klaartje Esch, Roman RejholdCZ, Kees de Valk († 2019), Riet van Gerven, Kate ŠtroblováCZ, Yvette LardinoisNO, Sasha Rose RichterDK, Christine Veraart, Virginie Gmelich Meijlingt van Dooren, Lukáš JasanskýCZ, Julia Fidder, Jan Gmelich Meijlingt († 2021), Pamela GrombacherDK, Frie J. JacobsBE, Hans Bommeljé, Jochem Weststrate, Jan-Willem van Rijnberk, Pim Steinman, Sylvia Hubrouck, Hans EnemanBE, Kris van der Hart, Cecilie BerntsDK, Jannike BrantåsSE, Huibert-Jan Vader, Hynek ŠnajdarCZ, Masoud ShahsavariSE, Rikard FåhraeusSE, Laetitia DeschampsSE, Roel van der LindenNL/CZ, Alice MáselníkováSE, Rana AnaniLB, Jörn BurmesterDK, Sebastian BernburgLB, Wilfried Agricola de CologneBRD, Yarina ButkowskaUA, Olga & Oleg KharchenkoUA, Ivan Van de CappelleBE, David DelifioraUSA, Dina MattarGaza, Raed IssaGaza, Robin Weijers, Harriët Rademakers, Ormira LulaniAL, Geert VerbekeBE, Carla Verbeke, Beste GürsuTR, Helidon HalitiAL, pietepuk

Galid Al Kholan FakeehYEM, André Smits, Zake PrelvukajKOS, Jürgen O. OlbrichBRD, Tineke SchuurmansBE, Marie VerbovenBE, Adam RoussopoulosUSA, Jatun RisbaRS, Franco G. LiveraRS, Issam Al Kholani Al Fakeeh, Bo de Jong, Zeus Hoenderop, Iris Van ’t Bos, Sait ToprakTR, Geeske Pluijmers, Tineke Smit, Ulrike E.W. ScholderBRD, Dirk D. KnickhoffBRD, Elisabeth SchinkBRD, Ruggero MaggiIT, Emillio MorandiIT, GordanaSP, Silvio De GraciaBR, Chris Kors, Lutz AndersBRD, Luiz Sacilotto&Marcia RosenbergerBR, Anne-Lyke van den Elshout, Fé Wielemakers, Floor Zegers, Arjelien van Dijke, Hein Verwer, Cor de Lange, Willy van Meegen, Marlize Laport, Roula KaraferiGRC, KeesPieter Geschiere, Carlita Da Cruz PeireraBEL, Pier Pennings, peter clouthBRD, Matthijs Heugen, Sonja TintelnotBRD, Fabio BonacinaIT, Erin Chang, Elizabeth Hefty-KhouryESP, Ibrahim KhouryLBN/ESP, Ron Tiry, KappaIT, Lucia CarotenutoARG, Nélida Torres BaltazarARG, Enzo CominIT, Safaa AshourLBN and the numerous participants in the poster project I.D. OF INEQUALITY.