Catalogue > At random

Wendelien Van Oldenborgh

Hier.

Doc. expérimental | 4k | couleur | 27:34 | Pays-Bas | 2021

Hier.(2021) moves seamlessly between politically charged reflections and personal memories through a constellation of voices and lyrical material. In Museum Arnhem (NL) during its renovation - a place of conservation in transition - we meet a cast of young women who express themselves through music, poetry and dialogue. Together they sensitively explore themes such as hybridity, trans-nationality and diasporic sensitivities in the midst of persistent reverberations of colonial history in contemporary society. Alongside the cast, the location Museum Arnhem, is also a meaningful “voice”. Originally built in the late 19th century as an ‘outdoors club’ by people with a colonial past, we see the building stripped down to its foundation, with worn concrete and elegant art nouveau features located next to each other. In this site of rubble and potential we follow three ‘sonic lines’: the band FRED, poet Pelumi Adejumo and historian Lara Nuberg. With music and poetry, we encounter not only socio-political urgencies, but also undercurrents of existentialist and vulnerable themes. Tenderly yet confident, we see the protagonists in friendship and cooperation, we hear about love, the sorrow that comes with it, life questions and certainties, by which they express the basis for a changing possible future.

Wendelien van Oldenborgh develops works, whereby the cinematic format is used as a methodology for production and as the basic language for various forms of presentation, collaborating with participants in different scenarios, to co-produce the script. Recent solo presentations include: work, work, work (work) at Museum Sztuki in Lodz 2021; tono lengua boca at Fabra i Coats, Barcelona 2020 and CA2M Madrid 2019-20; Cinema Olanda, at the Dutch Pavilion in the 57th Venice Biennial 2017. Van Oldenborgh has exhibited widely including the Chicago Architecture Biennial 2019, bauhaus imaginista, HKW Berlin 2019, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam 2020 and Sonsbeek20->24, Arnhem 2021.