Be the future of something else - publication St. Joost School of Art & Design

BE THE FUTURE OF SOMETHING ELSE

BE THE FUTURE OF SOMETHING ELSE

ST JOOST SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN

Vivian Bax

PROUDLY PRESENTING OUR GRADUATES

René Bosma Dean St. Joost School of Art & Design

5 It is often said that we need artists and designers to help solve the major societal issues of our time; climate change, the transition to sustainable energy, inequality, and restoring trust in democratic leadership and democracy itself. Their creativity and ability to imagine the world differently, in a myriad of ways, is a source of inspiration for cross sectoral collaboration that enriches civic engage­ ment. However, we should not make the mistake to claim that art and design finds its raison d’être from this capacity. The nature of the arts is intrin­ sically a space where thinking and experiment takes place freely, not only to be instrumentalised simply as a palliative for socio-political and economic ills.

Lotte Schrander

The artists and designers we educate at St. Joost School of Art & Design are given the opportunity to develop their creativity through conceptual thinking, imagination and personal narratives that arise from diverse backgrounds and cultures.

Whether they want to make films, performances, tell visual stories or undertake social interac­ tions, l­earning is personally motivated, and the educational programmes ensure that students are empowered to find their own voice; one that dares to speak out loud. This leads to novel ideas, engaged positions and impactful artworks.

As an art school, we are continuously evolving.

Areas of creative expertise are in constant flux due to changing social relationships and societal needs through technological developments and the cross­ over between other sectors. Art education ­develops towards new areas of expertise, and artists and designers are required to rethink and redefine their role. Take for example the ecological impact caused by climate change and the major task that artists and designers have to identify, question and design the narrative around ecological degradation.

Set amidst this backdrop is the urgent need to foreground an eco-centric paradigm and a collec­ tive reimagining that tackles the environmental crisis, which is now integrated as a practice-led research pathway in Ecology Futures at our Master Institute of Visual Cultures.

Lotte Schrander

Conducting both applied and in-depth artistic ­research is essential for the development and ­socially grounded position of the arts. With ­bachelor and master education and the arrival of a third cycle (professional doctorate) in art education, our understanding of the arts can further develop and build meaningful bridges between scientific research and methodologies for ­interdisciplinary ways of working.

To this end, we educate students to initiate processes and inventive methodologies intrinsic to art and design practices and we stimulate them to search for dialogue with their professional peers and surrounding networks. Each year we are proud to present a new group of bachelor and master graduates. With a selection of work in this ­publication we celebrate their energy and ideas.

Enjoy reading!

Work of the Class of 2021 can be found on: nowshow.nl thecurrent.is

MASTER 11 Robert Lombarts Yannan Pan Ananya Panda Ye Xu Femke Koppe

14 18 22 26 30

BACHELOR 33 Daphne van der Voort Zenzy Blindeling Kija Benford Jolijn Durinck Sonia Commandeur Michelle Smits Matunda Groenendijk Jerrold Saija Emma van der Leest

35 36 37 38 42 43 44

ABOUT ST. JOOST SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN 9 St. Joost School of Art & Design educates artists and designers of the future. The institute has been a highly renowned art school for more than 200 years and offers outstanding education at graduate and undergraduate level, with a strong personal approach. We offer art and design education at undergraduate level in Breda and ’s-Hertogenbosch and English programmes at graduate level at the Master Institute of Visual Cultures in ’s-Hertogen­ bosch. St. Joost School of Art & Design is part of Avans University of Applied Sciences, which has been rated the best ­university of applied sciences in the Netherlands for many years.

Alina Milkina

St. Joost School offers four ­bachelor programmes: — Art & Research — New Design & Attitudes — Illustrated & Animated Storytelling — Photography, Film & the Digital And two master degree programmes at the Master Institute of Visual Cultures: — Master of Arts in Animation — Master of Arts in Fine Art and Design: Visual Arts and Post Contemporary Practice, Ecology Futures, Situated Design

At St. Joost School of Art & Design we empower our students to contribute in unconventional ways to changing the complex and interconnected world we live in. Through our unique interdisciplinary pro­ grammes, a new generation of artists and designers are well prepared for a career in the world of the visual arts, design and the creative industry.

For more information about our institute please ­visit: stjoost.nl akvstjoostmasters.nl Hosein Daneshpajooh

Xandra van der Eijk

MA STER ST JOOST SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN

Sarah Podestani

EKP EXCELLENCE IN RESEARCH AWARD The EKP Excellence in Research Award is an ­annual award of € 2,500 for the best graduate research at master level, sponsored by SDK ­Vastgoed. The award acknowledges students’ ­creative ability to progress novel ideas into stimulating works, and accentuates the trans­ formative potential of artists and designers in the world. With the capacity to co-create knowledge, ­encourage critical thinking through process-­ orientated creative practice which can be located within experience, and raise the understanding of art and design as a powerful field that offers us another world view, the ambitions of our students’ are well-reflected on the award. It reinstates the indispensable value of arts research to enable them beyond their time at the institute – but as actors of change in society.

While its genesis is the celebration of research and creativity, the award originated from the collaboration between St. Joost School of Art & Design, and area developer SDK Vastgoed.

The transformation of the EKP site in the ­Bossche Spoorzone is on track to become a creative biotope where a cluster of the art school, creative ­businesses, cultural events, and residential spaces will not only facilitate the sustainable, inclusive, and knowledgeable growth of the area.

WACOM TALENT DEVELOPMENT AWARD At core of the Wacom Talent Development Award lies the acknowledgment of artists and designers’ potential of expression through animation. While recognizing the excellence of young artists within the creative industries in the fields of animation and design, it rewards their talent of storytelling – a powerful skill capable of evoking the critical reflections and conversations the world needs for progressive change.

THE FUTURE OF SOMETHING ELSE

Úna Henry Head of Education Master Institute of Visual Cultures

13 How can we create a future that is something else, another kind of world, one that we would like to live in?

We are proud to showcase the emerging talented artists and designers. Throughout this extraordi­ nary time of the pandemic, they have developed works which show the visionary power of art and its ability to forge new concepts and ways of think­ ing. Using the imaginary power of art, they build other representations of the world and other types of relations to generate ethical and value driven knowledge to envision another future capable of transforming the world we live in.

The expanded pedagogical scope of the Master Institute of Visual Cultures has created new ­opportunities for transdisciplinarity, interdis­ ciplinarity and co-research across our master ­programmes. The combining of arts thinking, theory, and knowledge production through ­inter­disciplinary practices provides graduates an enhanced view of their own research across a wide range of fields while widening the debate on where arts research can be taken. This estab­ lishes further the impetus for developing an arts research culture to generate novel ways of think­ ing and creative practice. Artistic research and its adhering discourse are imperative to addressing the role of the arts in relation to themes of inter­ national relevance with a focus on transcultural issues and cross disciplinary action, questions of ecology, climate change, migration, coexist­ ence, and inequality as an existential urgency of our time.

Subtending this, is our mission to contribute to the world we live in, working collaboratively and creatively with the cultural and creative sector, NGO’s, business and government, to generate new knowledge and exchange of that knowledge so that we might collectively imagine another future.

By providing a transformative education, it’s our responsibility to empower students to become

the new generation of artists and designers who will contribute in novel ways to problematising and ­potentially changing our complex and inter­ connected world. By creating a unique educational environment where the tradition of studio prac­ tices sits at ease with ideas and context-driven ­practices and where artists and designers together through an interchange of ways of thinking and co-­research, we create new knowledge to tackle some of the most pressing and challenging issues of our time. Highlighting the societal ramification of ­creative work, we see our responsibility to be thought leaders demonstrating the value of ­creativity to society, and through dissemination to contribute to an increased awareness and ­understanding of the importance of art and design as a field of knowledge.

Sharing their unconventional ways of thought and creativity, these students take us on an inspiring journey to communicate and open discussions, and raise awareness that offers us another world view that might be the future of something else.

Robert Lombarts 14

Filament

MA Visual Arts and Post Contemporary Practice robertlomabarts.com — Nominee EKP Excellence in Research Award 2021

Through the performative misuse of everyday ­objects, Robert Lombarts elicits symbioses in which material, image and location tend to swap places. He creates systems in which medium and signifier mingle into each other. This can cause the medium to transform from a platform into a container without losing its actual shape or function.

In his latest works he uses obsolete technology such as analog TV sets, portable DVD players or cassette recorders as tools to connect small, personal gestures with events happening in the cosmos.

For example: five percent of the snow that is ­visible on the screen of an analog TV set is radia­ tion remnant from the Big Bang. Lombarts burned a page out of his diary to present the ashes close to a television so the static electricity could cause the ashes to fly towards its screen and merge with the snow depicted on it. This way he was able to connect a personal observation, made on a random day, with the moment the universe was born.

We were very impressed with the precision in Robert’s work. It shows great attention to detail and creates a poetic narrative between location, material and image. His work fits into a tradition of art which weaves narratives around otherwise overlooked or redundant objects and situations.

The installation demonstrates how even the most prosaic of spaces can be transformed to speak of existential anxieties and metaphysical awe.

— David Haines, Dr. Janice McNab (external experts)

Yannan Pan 18

MA Visual Arts and Post Contemporary Practice — Nominee EKP Excellence in Research Award 2021

Loneliness in Absurdity

Through her ever evolving and experimental practice that seamlessly combines photography, film, performance, and installation, Yannan Pan attempts to study how art can reshape the ­experience of loneliness through the strategies of absurdity. Working with absurdist s­ trategies – which allow the viewer to simultaneously keep ­distance and see the possibilities beyond loneliness, all while exploring meaningful social interactions – she aims to visualize and share her own experience of seclusion. It is her hope that these artworks ultimately resonate with viewers and ­liberate them from the confines of their s­ elf-alienation. Loneliness is ubiquitous and she believes that strategies of absurdity can help people to accept, cope, and coexist with it in an unexpectedly positive way.

Yannan Pan (1996) is a visual artist born and raised in China, and currently lives and works as an artist in Shanghai. Her journey into photography began in 2017. Upon first moving abroad, art ­creation, especially photography, proved to be

a pivotal tool for her to process and record her inner world after facing severe discrimination from her peers. Primarily presented in black and white film, most of her works explored using the body as a medium and metaphor to reveal darker themes.

Yannan has a very convincing ability to frame an image and create poignant, melancholic images and as such, we were extremely touched by your work. She manages to create a visual language which, while being born out of traumatic experience, also resonates with all of us in our digitally overloaded society. Her work reflects the absurdity of both everyday actions and our digital personas, grounding these reflections in gritty and often hard-hitting personal narratives.

— David Haines, Dr. Janice McNab (external experts)

Ananya Panda 22

MA Situated Design behance.net/ananyapanda — Nominee EKP Excellence in Research Award 2021

Self-sufficient Nodes

Self-sufficient Nodes is an examination of the human labor that feeds into machine ‘intelligence’ in the form of the ghost-work of metadata tagging, data set curation, content moderation etc. The ­artwork moves between compliance with, and critique of a system that renders the bodies, senses, and cognition of diverse workers into com­ putational resources. The re-enactment of digitally mediated wage labor relations on crowdsourcing platforms such as Amazon Mechanical Turk is used as a strategy to think through this technology.

Veering between abstraction and representation, the video installation weaves together the worlds of workers dispersed in the Cloud through a collection of screenshots, shared Google Docs, Excel sheets, footage, digital and physical artefacts. This explo­ ration chronicles the lived realities of the working crowd while asking what power its members hold beyond their designated role as nodes in a global information network, potentially creating a provo­ cation for the viewers, along with an invitation to become entangled in this complex web.

Ananya Panda is a visual artist interested in pattern as a device to represent and communicate information, tracing the notion from perceptual to social realms. Ananya’s practice revolves around collecting and reconfiguring materials, forms, gestures and stories across space and time to forge new constellations of meaning. Through story­telling, she hopes to produce fixed and moving images that help access worlds othered in the contemporary configuration of Platform capitalism.

Ananya’s work is a considered and careful examination of the work of Mechanical Turk workers.

She incorporates beading into the work and the visual of this beadwork becomes echoed in the pixelated images presented on the screen. While Ananya’s thesis was precise and eloquent in its ­description of care for and immersion into the ­digital underclass of the Turker community she carried out, in the artwork Ananya allows herself to fuzz the edges, make it blurry. She allows an ironic sense of humour to emerge, with the clock and the ‘hustle’ neon sign. Ananya’s work resonates with the beauty and horror of our contemporary digital lives.

— Dr. Michelle Kazprzak, Angelique Spaninks (external experts)

Ye Xu 26

MA Situated Design yeeeeeee.com — Nominee EKP Excellence in Research Award 2021

Gayuan, Life in the Mountains

‘Gayuan, Life in the Mountains’ is a series of documentary formed by multiple media including photos, videos, illustrations and animations.

It presents the artists’ experience of growing up in the rural village Gayuan in southeast China, where people still maintain a traditional farming life formed through thousands of years of history. ­Besides knowledge and technique of farming, it’s also about the indigenous understanding of the Nature we inhabit and rely on.

Through personal experience-based way of ­narration, Ye Xu tries to share a methodology of how we can objectify, problematize, and situate ourselves within the Nature shared by other (­human/non-human, living/non-living) beings, observe our pluralistic and intense connections with the surroundings, and reflect on what we are as human beings.

Xu works as a visual designer on graphic design and has been shifting to becoming an animator and illustrator dedicated to non-profit public education on popular science and indigenous culture. The work covers broad topics including psychology, physiology, ecology, and ethnography.

“I still remember how my mom enjoyed my first ­stop-motion animation; watching it over and over again. That was the moment when my work finally made sense to her – an ordinary farmer like many other residents in the village where I grew up, although my occupation as a designer is still out of her ­comprehension. It’s also when I realized people with little formal education like her were not obliged to learn design, but as a designer I am here to fill the gap and make it accessible and enjoyable for them. Design has become an important tool to connect and communicate with vaster audiences, and exchange different life experiences.”

Ye’s work is reflective and personal, sharing his rural home with viewers. The details Ye chooses to share are brimming with meaning: the battle with entropy, cleaning, the fight with fleas – each ­element has something more to it and yet also can be read at face value. As a viewer, we can follow him bridging the worlds of his life: his childhood village and his current global experiences, his keen eye for all things great and small, human and non-human, local and global, cultural and social, old and new. At the same time, he leaves enough room for us to apply our own emotions to his everyday rural life and his family’s story, with a visual style that is evocative and beautiful. After watching Ye’s work, one feels as though they have had a personal visit to a place they do not know yet feels familiar.

— Dr. Michelle Kazprzak, Angelique Spaninks (external experts)

Femke Koppe 30

MA Animation @ kattekoppe — Winner Wacom Talent Development Award 2021

Jij bent de kapitein

Femke Koppe shares her thoughts about the role of animation and the potential of storytelling through her final animation project ‘Jij bent de kapitein’ (You are the captain!), a short animation for children about sexual abuse.

Can you tell us about your work and why you chose the main topic?

Children are learning everything about the world and about life. They are open to valuable lessons they can take with them – especially when it comes to larger topics at hand. I was wondering what I could help the world with. Because children get caught with sexual abuse much more often than is talked about, I was motivated to start that conversation, but in a light-hearted way. I believe lightness can help children and people in general to talk and think through difficult topics better.

In children’s formative years, we often see that media is mainly meant to entertain and pass the time. There is so much going on in their minds, I think it’s worth to create material that helps them reflecting about life and processing it. Of course, incorporating some silliness is important too to keep the lightness and fun. That’s what you see in my animation project ‘Jij bent de kapitein’.

What developments in the field of art and ­design do you look forward to?

I’m looking forward to developments in children’s books. I want to help children to explore more ­difficult topics, and the bigger life questions ­children are often curious about – this is some­ thing I would like to be involved in.

What do you think is the potential of ­storytelling, art and design?

It can make difficult topics easier to talk about and show and represent certain situations in less scary ways. Also, it makes topics more accessible for audiences (in this case, children) to identify, relate and understand scenarios they might be experiencing themselves. Once we identify our­ selves with a character or a feeling, we can explore it deeper and obtain more insights about ourselves.

Personally, animations have helped me in that way.

From a broader perspective, I think animation is very imaginative; people have huge fantasy worlds.

Exploring and sharing them allows us to learn about more about each other.

What is your artistic process/professional journey?

I combined lots of sketching while I was doing research – they go really hand in hand. It made me realize how much easier the work will be if you intertwine them in the process. That’s how I got the idea for the final animation.

Where are you headed professionally?

I want to work on a freelance base. I also would like to do projects involving children and conveying values. I want my work to be fun, not too serious.

I see my work as light-hearted, yet seeking depth.

Femke has created a beautiful, important piece of work – a great contribution to today’s society while simultaneously displaying a distinct artistic voice.

— Erwin van den IJssel (external expert)

BA CHE LOR ST JOOST SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN

ST. JOOSTPENNING & LUCASPRIJS Every year, the municipalities of Breda and ­’s-­Hertogenbosch sponsor awards for best ­graduation work of undergraduates at St. Joost, the St. Joostpenning and Lucasprijs. With these prestigious awards, each €2,500, the municipal­ ities want to stimulate a first step in the career of young artists and designers and connect young talent to the city. Candidates are ­nominated ­during the final exams by external ­experts. ­Thereafter, a jury consisting of experts in the field of visual art and design selects the winners of the St. ­Joostpenning and Lucasprijs.

All nominations are inspiring and an e­ xample of how individual talent can develop at a distinctive level over the years. The projects are distinguished by topical themes and ­research into ­concept, choice of form and ­quality in execution.

— René Bosma, Marieke Wiegel, Lex van Lith (jury St. Joostpenning and Lucasprijs 2021)

Daphne van der Voort

BA New Design & Attitudes daphnevdvoort.com — Nominee St. Joostpenning 2021

Everybody is a genius “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live it’s whole life believing that it is stupid.” (Albert Einstein) In our search for intelligence in other animals, we were looking for human qualities, using human measures, based on a human perspective of the world. Which is strange…

Intelligence has evolved in such a way that it fits perfectly in the environment of the animal.

35

A squirrel can’t count to ten, but that is something she doesn’t need. A squirrel can hide thousands of nuts in the forest and find them back during the cold winter, while I can’t even remember where I left my keys.

And that’s okay. Just like a squirrel doesn’t need our numerical system, we don’t need its extraordi­ nary memory. The intelligence of one species isn’t better than the other because we all have different challenges in our perspective of the world.

Zenzy Blindeling 36

BA Illustrated & ­Animated Storytelling @ themissingpagesproject — Nominee St. Joostpenning 2021

The Missing Pages Project

Kija Benford Jolijn Durinck

37

Vrouwenmantel Art Research Group Space for researching the maternal in art.

Vrouwenmantel Art Research Group is an art ­initiative who creates spaces for researching the maternal in art, the maternal that can be ­assumed in the art practice and alternative ­models in art that are found on a care-based work ethic in which being a mother and an artist can form a symbiosis.

Celebrating and teaching Black art history through textile and fashion.

The Missing Pages is a project started to offer people a jumping off point to learn more about art history from Africa and the African diaspora. Black art, from music to fashion to fine art, is everywhere and only growing in popularity. But if you take a look at art history books and curriculums, there seems to be little if any black artists mentioned.

I want to teach people more about black art history in a way that makes it accessible to anyone, not just people well-versed in art history. I use textile

design to get people interested in the subject and artist, and because you can own it and wear it yourself, it makes it more personal and memorable.

The designs are all inspired by one of three black artists, and are based on a subject from either the Netherlands, Suriname, or Curaçao.

BA Art & Research vrouwenmantel-artresearchgroup.com — Nominee St. Joostpenning 2021

The spaces that are created are spaces where integrity, safety, inclusivity and caregiving are main priorities. Vrouwenmantel Art Research Group develops workshops, writes articles, ­publishes zines and collaborates with other artists and cultural organizations.

Sonia Commandeur 38

DONNA

BA Photography, Film & the Digital soniacommandeur.com — Winner St. Joostpenning 2021

As a director, Sonia Commandeur (1990) is ­inter­ested in behavior by considering it through case studies, theory and field research. Different environments and situations influence the way we act and can create a tension between our internal feelings and how we express ourselves in public.

In her films, Commandeur challenges her audience by not providing a clear narrative. Instead, she presents a sketch of a life based on self-contained scenes wherein you’re actively encouraged to look further and open up a conversation with yourself and others.

You’re interested in social contexts: ­communities, institutions and different cultures. What are you looking for?

The beauty of the everyday, the unheard stories in society. For me, the power of fiction lies in the fact that reality can be sketched in film, but which would not quickly come to light in ‘actual’ reality. At the moment I’m very interested in meritocracy: that we can move up based on our own accomplishments, and that everyone has the same opportunities. While, we don’t have the same ­opportunities. Thinking like this creates a big division between winners and losers and less ­compassion for those who don’t succeed in the eyes of the society. That’s why I want to capture real contact between people, the purity of who we are and how we react.

What does this intention require from you?

I write and read a lot. About defense mechanisms, behavioral patterns and today’s society. To me, being a director means bringing together elements, such as research and scenography. To write the dialogues I use improvisation, based on certain predetermined actions and sentences as well as background stories that I create together with my actors. They don’t have to play themselves. ­However, it’s important to bring out their rawness: that which makes us human. I can’t necessarily direct that, but I can create an open setting to make this possible.

Is this your view on art: being a safe space in which we can be ourselves?

Art can encourage acceptance and movement.

It is personal and you can find recognition, support and love in it. I think it’s important that there ­remains a need for work that is not mainstream, not for the general public, for which there may be less demand. There must be space for the

versatility of artistic voices. Ultimately you create for others, and they’re not the same at all.

Who do you create for, and what context does that entail?

My dream is to make more movies. I would like to show my films at film festivals, where they can be watched openly. Being a director, I try to work objectively: to gather multiple perspectives and to portray them broadly. You can really tell something in films and make a difference with it. Next to film, I would like to work in the social field part-time.

Sonia’s graduation project is a slice of life, ­coming-of-age fiction movie about the thirteenyear-old Donna who hides her personal identity to avoid the powerlessness she feels in relation to others. Identity develops in relation to a ­person’s environment. But what happens when the different social environments a person moves between don’t match and don’t share the same values, rules and understanding?

With an analytical substantiation of the choices made in the work, Sonia transcends the level of graduation. The subject is actual. In this ‘coming of age’ story, content and form coincide, but at the same time raise questions; what am I looking at now? Is this real or is it fiction? The maker gives us an honest insight into the world of young people, at home, on the street, in the intimacy of the bedroom, in family ties and friendship and in doing so makes you think; what future do the donnas of this world have?

— René Bosma, Marieke Wiegel, Lex van Lith (jury St. Joostpenning and Lucasprijs 2021)

Michelle Smits 42

BA New Design & Attitudes @ de.mengelmoes — Nominee Lucasprijs 2021

Still Here

If it doesn’t hit you, it’ll hit someone you love.

Welcome to this frightening yet dreamy world, the world of Alzheimer’s. It is a world you would rather not enter, but unfortunately this will happen to many of us. One in five Dutch people are potential­ ly prone to this terrible diagnosis, and even one in three women. So, we can say; if it doesn’t hit you, it’ll hit someone you love.

Matunda Groenendijk Synthesis

BA Illustrated & Animated Storytelling @ bymatunda — Nominee Lucasprijs 2021

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I am not a designer who solves problems, I am the designer who draws attention to what I believe is underexposed. And no, we cannot see everything, but we can learn to be aware of how blind we sometimes are. With this project, I shine a light on this disease by means of a visualization. How can we find a language for something that cannot be described with words?

It is a reality that will transform the world as you know it, and that is often misunderstood. ­Alzheimer’s is also full of beautiful moments and intimate contact.

Immersive storytelling is what keeps me busy during the day and awake at night. I am fascinated with environments where every detail joins together in one story. As a 3D artist I explore immersivity in Virtual & Augmented Reality by experimenting in Unity & Blender.

Synthesis is a Virtual Reality installation which takes you into the world of Walter Gardner, an old painter who loses himself in the unending process of his next masterpiece. Only when he accepts his hopeless situation, can he look at the world through new eyes.

In a society focused on performance we are ­confronted almost daily with questions like: Am I good enough? Do I matter? Do I add anything to this world? People are always so busy worrying about their place in the world that they never wonder about what life can give them. Synthesis follows Gardner’s journey to a new, liberating worldview. Enjoying the sun, clouds and wind, he rediscovers himself and his passion in painting.

Jerrold Saija 44

BA Art & Research @ dlorrej ­­ — Winner Lucasprijs 2021

Nagels zonder hoofden

Artist Jerrold Saija (1996) wants to get in touch with his lost, ancestral history by focuses on the painful Moluccan, colonial past and its influence on life today. As he writes: “Something is wrong with the construction in which I wake up every day.” Western constructions are globally placed in other communities and symbolize power, or are remnants of a past in need of re- and deconstruc­ tion. By working with construction and scaffolding materials, Saija investigates when a construction is a construction for everyone.

You recently graduated with performative ­installations and sculptures. What are the questions you are asking yourself?

My work is about coming into contact with ances­ tral knowledge, by which I mean ‘embodying’. How do you connect with ancestral memories that are not mentioned in texts, archives? How can anyone understand what has been erased? Who made it possible for you to be here? This last question was asked during the Decolonial Summer School, which I attended. We focused on how colonialism and modernity is all around, and it gave me the notion of ‘Coming into Voice’: How to pronounce yourself and practice visibility?

Do you see and feel this urgency moving more widely in the arts?

We’re moving in the right direction, thinking about changes in people’s visibility and how you can ­support each other. Decolonial thinking is an option: How to engage decolonial thinking and applying it in art practice? It’s about relating to the other: moving from universal thinking to pluriversality. Thinking in terms of the universal is ­actually really unrealistic; many different ­cosmologies and human experiences live side by side, as they have always done.

How will you continue this investigation?

I am going to start a Masters, Ecologies of Trans­ formation at the Sandberg Institute. It substanti­ ates the idea that learning from the past helps to visualize and grow new futures, working with the question: How can embodiment and art making facilitate social change?’ ‘Ecologies’ here refers to be part of a collective and its growth and trans­ formation. I would like to have a collective around me and put my energy into working together.

What does that mean for you: centralizing ­something and getting it done, together?

Growing towards a similar direction and exchanging knowledge, being critical towards each other and creating a domestic, friendly space. Ecologies use a model based on the wood wide web: a mycelial network that trees have. It’s about collaborative relationships, consensual exchange of nutrients and care.

What is this vision of art based on?

My aunt always took me to museum De Domijnen, Sittard. Through her I became acquainted with the work of Mark Dion and Bettye Saar, among others.

I found in them the layers that I apply in my own work: humor, poetics, subtlety and being critical, in my own way. The latter is what I’m exploring now: How do you connect with ancestral memories that are not mentioned, how to understand what has been erased?

Nagels zonder Hoofden is an installation, ­sculpture, performance: Something is wrong with the construction in which I wake up every day. Beams, piles, bricks and insulation, the remnants of a time tinged with pain. ­Problems have existed here, long before I have. I dream of new structures, I feel a need.

How can I use this foundation? Last week, I asked an ­architect to take a look, she told me: ‘Actually… you’re fucked!’

Jerrold connects the present with the past.

The ­immersive experience is dissected and reconstructed in different dimensions. Big and small, hard and soft are tangible and sometimes transformed into another reality. They play with different sensory stimuli and experiences in a visual way; touch, smell, sight and sound. In the modesty of the maker there is a great autonomous power that forces you to descend to the small and zoom out again to the total. Who are you and where do you come from, what connects us culturally and as human beings? With the created series of visual works and performative actions, a real statement is made, with integrity and thoughtfulness.

— René Bosma, Marieke Wiegel, Lex van Lith (jury St. Joostpenning and Lucasprijs 2021)

This edition is published by St. Joost School of Art & Design, part of Avans University of Applied Sciences October 2021 Cover: Vera Meulendijks Interviews: Liza Voetman, Maria Indjeian Diaz Design: Carel Fransen Print: Tielen (Boxtel) Binding: Brepols (Turnhout) Photographs: Vivian Bax, Lotte Schrander, Xandra van der Eijk, Sarah ­Podestani, Hosein Daneshpajooh, Alina Milkina Contributions: René Bosma, Úna Henry, Anke van den Broeck, Marloes Vreeswijk, Marjan Middelhoff, Karin Krijgsman, Robert Lombarts, Yannan Pan, Ananya Panda, Ye Xu, Femke Koppe, Kija Benford & Jolijn Durinck, Zenzy Blindeling, Daphne van der Voort, Sonia Commandeur, Jerrold Saija, Michelle Smits, Matunda Groenendijk

St. Joost School of Art & Design Beukenlaan 1, 4845 CR Breda Parallelweg 21, 5223 AL ’s‑Hertogenbosch stjoost.nl Master Institute of Visual Cultures Parallelweg 21–23, 5223 AL ’s-Hertogenbosch akvstjoostmasters.nl

Cover: Vera Meulendijks Interviews: Liza Voetman, Maria Indjeian Diaz Design: Carel Fransen Print: Tielen (Boxtel) Binding: Brepols (Turnhout) Photographs: Vivian Bax, Lotte Schrander, Xandra van der Eijk, Sarah ­Podestani, Hosein Daneshpajooh, Alina Milkina Contributions: René Bosma, Úna Henry, Anke van den Broeck, Marloes Vreeswijk, Marjan Middelhoff, Karin Krijgsman, Robert Lombarts, Yannan Pan, Ananya Panda, Ye Xu, Femke Koppe, Kija Benford & Jolijn Durinck, Zenzy Blindeling, Daphne van der Voort, Sonia Commandeur, Jerrold Saija, Michelle Smits, Matunda Groenendijk

St. Joost School of Art & Design Beukenlaan 1, 4845 CR Breda Parallelweg 21, 5223 AL ’s‑Hertogenbosch stjoost.nl Master Institute of Visual Cultures Parallelweg 21–23, 5223 AL ’s-Hertogenbosch akvstjoostmasters.nl

BE THE FUTURE OF SOMETHING ELSE

This edition is published by St. Joost School of Art & Design, part of Avans University of Applied Sciences October 2021