Stay Flexible! is a reflective research on community and collaboration materialized in an exhibition. We wanted to explore the potential of organizing the graduation exhibition of our class as our graduation work to celebrate our class and department. We worked on the spatial design, graphic identity and curation of our class’ works. We also programmed a portable radio show, a screening space and organized dinners, drinks and social gatherings.
What started off as an exhibition design project, soon evolved into a social interplay between us, our class and the studio space we would present our graduation show in. Working with reused material – curved tubes, sewn and cut textile, left-over floorings – the materials all leave traces of their previous use. These material cues influenced the spatial design, letting it guide the process rather than bending it to our will. Closely looking at what was available to us, the project focused on reaction and continuation: building upon what is already there, holding on to it for a moment, and guiding it towards its next journey.
This interaction generated an entangled and layered group effort as a context where boundaries between ownership started to blur. Exhibiting the projects close to each other, the works become entangled, resembling the way our natural working spaces looked. In this collaborative practice, it can never be said that what you do belongs solely to you, it is the accumulation of interactions with those around you: material, immaterial, living, and non-living.
The program and group dynamics were a very important part of the graduation work. During the process leading to the exhibition (which was documented into a process movie by Cheonghyeon Park), multiple fermentation cooking sessions and dinners were organised with our class and tutors. Cooking together kept the mood high and made the class in tune with each other. During the exhibition itself, fermented drinks were served to all visitors in a space intentionally left the way it normally looks: a messy studio. The program also consisted of a radio show which would be hosted before and during the exhibition. We looked for ways to introduce unpredictable, non fixed elements to the exhibition. Interlude Radio became the manifestation of this element. Guests were invited to speak during the exhibition being interviewed on a movable cart. This cart would change position in the exhibition and people could listen and join in.
The exhibition became an entangled, living thing which invited others, welcoming them into the alternative ways of looking at the world we and our classmates envision.
Together with: Aga Jurczak, Aleksejs Mališevs, Andreea Pirlica, Carly Rose Bedford, Cheonghyeon Park, Diederick Nolthenius, Dora Lehy, Enrique Torres Takahashi, Ernie Mellegers, Femke Dekker, Forbo Flooring Systems, Heejeen Choo, Herman Verkerk, Hyuna Park, Ina Miteva, Iuliia Khatsanova, Jaime Verheij, Janina Bahvalova, Josha Zwanenburg, Juliette de Groot, Julius Dusch, Laura Ajola, Lorien Beijaert, Léonie von Saldern, Manon Carpentier, Monika Szewczyk, Orlando Maaike Gouwenberg, Reza Afisina, Sep Louter, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Suhyun Park, Sunhyo Mastenbroek, Suraya Latul, Thijs Fisser and Wiktoria Markiewicz
