Curating the Campus . Richard Venlet
Untitled, 2002 - Untitled 2005
2002
Container with mirrored surface, in the corridor next to the Blue Hall
293 x 405 x 278 cm
On loan from the artist
From 2003 to 2009
In 2004, the then curator at deSingel, Moritz Küng, initiated the Curating the Campus project. The intention was to give visual art a permanent place on the campus alongside architecture, dance, music and theatre. Each year, Küng invited an artist to conceive a new work, or else he retained a site-specific work after the end of an exhibition. The project gradually expanded into a collection of permanent works created by eleven artists from Belgium, France, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States.
In 2003 deSingel launched the Curating the Library book and library project on the initiative of Moritz Küng. Every month for seven years two speakers – architects, choreographers, composers, philosophers, artists, writers and theorists – were invited to introduce their favourite books and then to leave copies of them in a library. This constantly expanding collection was housed in a sculptural container designed by Richard Venlet, which he had originally produced for the 2002 Sao Paolo Biennale to display his own work in. Afterwards, at the M HKA, he used the container for solo exhibitions by artist friends. And finally, at deSingel, the mirrored sculpture became the face of Curating the Library. For seven years it accommodated a collection that ultimately totalled 1557 books. In summer 2009 the sculpture finally had to make way for the new public circuit that took shape as part of the extension of deSingel with the new ‘Beel’ building.
Richard Venlet (1964, Hamilton, AUS. Lives in Brussels). His work has been shown at M HKA in Antwerp (2014), SMAK in Ghent (2013, solo exhibition) and Ludlow 38 in New York (2013).
Container with mirrored surface, in the corridor next to the Blue Hall
293 x 405 x 278 cm
On loan from the artist
From 2003 to 2009
In 2004, the then curator at deSingel, Moritz Küng, initiated the Curating the Campus project. The intention was to give visual art a permanent place on the campus alongside architecture, dance, music and theatre. Each year, Küng invited an artist to conceive a new work, or else he retained a site-specific work after the end of an exhibition. The project gradually expanded into a collection of permanent works created by eleven artists from Belgium, France, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States.
In 2003 deSingel launched the Curating the Library book and library project on the initiative of Moritz Küng. Every month for seven years two speakers – architects, choreographers, composers, philosophers, artists, writers and theorists – were invited to introduce their favourite books and then to leave copies of them in a library. This constantly expanding collection was housed in a sculptural container designed by Richard Venlet, which he had originally produced for the 2002 Sao Paolo Biennale to display his own work in. Afterwards, at the M HKA, he used the container for solo exhibitions by artist friends. And finally, at deSingel, the mirrored sculpture became the face of Curating the Library. For seven years it accommodated a collection that ultimately totalled 1557 books. In summer 2009 the sculpture finally had to make way for the new public circuit that took shape as part of the extension of deSingel with the new ‘Beel’ building.
Richard Venlet (1964, Hamilton, AUS. Lives in Brussels). His work has been shown at M HKA in Antwerp (2014), SMAK in Ghent (2013, solo exhibition) and Ludlow 38 in New York (2013).
Credits
artist