hans overvliet | i.d. of a shared key | catalogue

DISTANT SUFFERING VI

www.hansovervliet.com

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studio address | Dreesstraat 2, Vlissingen www.hansovervliet.com curiositas@zeelandnet.nl photo ©2022 courtesy of Willy van Houtum

DISTANT SUFFERING VI | i.d. of a shared key - 2015 work in progress work (selections from in total) 215 used, cleaned tin cans an imprint of a key, pressed into plaster in the shape of a gold bar

photo courtesey of ©Dirk KnickhoffGermany Verbeke FoundationBelgium November 23, 2025

Kulturverein projektraum bahnhof25 | Kleve | Germay | December 2023

EEJ! Goes | October 2023 |

photos | courtesy of ©2023 André Smits

Part of the Lípa Art Collection | Prague | Czech Republic - 2022

Luxfer Open Space Česká SkaliceCzech Republic | 2021

Kunstpodium ‘T’ | Tilburg Steal like an Artist! - 2020 tribute to Christian and Luc Boltanski

contribution N8vdN8 Middelburg | 31/10/’16

Theater De Fransche School Culemborg | 23 oktober 2016

Art Gouda | het Weeshuis | residence | 01/06/’16 – 05/06/’16

justification

Palestinian refugees, whom I met from the early eighties on to the present day, treasure the keys of their homes from which they were expelled from 1948 on by the colonial state of Israel. The current generation Palestinians carries all kinds of keys and key chains as jewellery.

The artwork consists of 215 scoured biscuit tins, of which I removed the enamel and / or paint. Inside each of the tins rests a print of a key, pressed into plaster in the shape of a gold bar.

The can functions also as a container of the memories of my own safe childhood, storing my secret treasures. It is also the metaphor of the forgotten memory [with forgotten postcards, far forgotten coins from countries visited, etc.] that everybody has picked away.

Each exhibition image is determined in situ, often in sync with Willy van Houtum.

DISTANT SUFFERING | the project

Hans Overvliet | DISTANT SUFFERING Since 2013, by means of the ongoing art-series DISTANT SUFFERING, the Dutch artist Hans Overvliet 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 1980s. Of course these experiences resonate in DISTANT SUFFERING. So aspects of power, politics, exclusion, censorship and the connection between 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 criticism is special, so that the work never becomes bitter or pedantic, while at the same time the dialogue with the viewer is actively maintained. It is a tender form of activism that moves and urges action and also continuously questions the role of art. .

of activism that moves and urges action and also continuously questions the role of art.

Elements of DISTANT SUFFERING were exhibited in the Netherlands, Belgium, Pakistan, England, France, Italy, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Albania, Germany, Lebanon, the U.S.A., Brasil, Argentina and Sweden.

In 2023, his whole body of paper collages ( 1999 – 2012 ) joined Geert Verbeke’s renowned collection of collages and assemblages.

In 2024 - 2025 the whole oeuvre of DISTANT SUFFERING was exhibited in the museum part of the Verbeke Foundation. All the work will then be included in the permanent collection.

Hans Overvliet was born in Leiden in 1952; he lives in Middelburg and works in Vlissingen, both in the province of Zeeland in the South-West of the Netherlands.

Next to his art-work he is, together with his wife Willy van Houtum, the founder and every day guardian of the 30-year old space for contemporary art: ruimteCAESUUR. Here you’ll find his extended portfolio.

Exhibition places Thanks to

Verbeke Foundation | Kemseke – Belgium | 2024 – 2025 Thanks: Geert Verbeke, Marie Verboven – curator. kunstverein projektraum-bahnhof25 | Kleve – Germany | 2023 Thanks: project team - Dirk D. Knickhoff, Elisabeth Schink, Ulrike E.W. Scholder.

EEJ! Goes | 2023 Thanks: (photos ©) Andre Smits, Iris van ’t Bos. Part of the Lípa Art Collection | Prague – Czech Republic | 2022 Thanks: painter/curator/collector Roel van der Linden.

Luxfer Open Space | Česká Skalice – Czech Republic | residence | 2021 Thanks: curators Kate Štroblová and Roman Rejholt.

Photos, including the rear cover ©Lukáš Jasanský.

Kunstpodium ‘T’ – Tilburg | Steal like an Artist! | 2020 Thanks: painter / curator Niek Hendrix - Lost Painters.

N8VDN8 – Middelburg | 2016 Thanks: Huibert-Jan Vader, Giel Louws.

Theater De Fransche School – Culemborg | 2016 Israel - Palestine | 'My Land' - film and debate on two peoples and one country Thanks: Peter Steutel.

Art Gouda | residence | 2016 Thanks: Trude Linde, Rolf van der Mije, Wendy Speksnijder, Kris van der Hart, Jean Lamaison, Katinka Lampe, Ralf Westerhof, Galerie Frank Taal.

Special thanks to Giel Louws, Willy van Houtum & Jen Gossé, people with reciprocity as the quintessence in their discourse.

All photos with cans on black background courtesy ©2021 Giel Louws.

DISTANT SUFFERING