NORTH EXPEDITION

2017

EXPEDITIE NOORD (‘NORTH EXPEDITION’) is a collective walk through a riverside landscape, commissioned by Festival De Oversteek. During this walk, we used viewing tools to elicit interaction between the human body, the environment and fellow walkers. During three walking exercises at different locations near the river Waal in Nijmegen, participants explored my latest viewing tools. A series of text cards with quotes invited the viewer to look at the landscape in a different way and to discuss it with a fellow walker using the words on the card. Portable mirrors of different sizes were attached to clothing and shoes to provide an unexpected, tilted and expanded perspective on the surroundings, one’s own body and other bodies. A large blue sheet, with round holes, encouraged participants to experiment with scale on a micro and macro level. Zooming in on a small part of the environment, lying on the ground looking at the earth, and zooming out to take in the vast space around you when you turn over on your back: this sheet was the first version of the work OBSERVER (2018-2019). For each experiment with a viewing tool, I chose a different place and backdrop in the landscape around the urban island on the river Waal, so that we could trace a route along the river while walking.