PRESENTATION: Delinking and Relinking In the Van Abbemuseum Collection

The Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven opened a comprehensive new collection display featuring 120 pieces of art and spanning all five floors of the museum’s collection wing. The exhibition “Delinking and Relinking In the Van Abbemuseum Collection” invites visitors to experience art differently. Sometimes in the literal sense, by touching, smelling or listening to it; other times metaphorically, by giving expression to different, lesser known or previously unheard voices.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Van Abbe Museum Archive

Mostly inspiring and occasionally confrontational, “Delinking and Relinking In the Van Abbemuseum Collection” reveals to visitors how artists from 1900 to the present day respond to different cultures and perspectives. It explores how they tackle the big questions of their era, and how their artworks relate directly to what they see, feel and experience happening around them. The exhibition unfolds over three axes. One highlights events and relationships that have shaped the museum collection. Another addresses the whole body of the visitor, seeking to break with the modernist, ocular, disembodied tradition. The exhibition explores touch, smell and various sensory combinations to access different registers of emotion and understanding. Finally, the stories within the exhibition are plural and contrasting. Diverse communities from Eindhoven offer their perspectives on the art held by their museum. With over 25 multi­sensory tools, including texts in Braille, scent interpretations, tactile drawings and soundscapes, Delinking and Relinking represents the first, fully multi­sensory collection display in the Netherlands. Besides enriching the museum experience for everyone, the exhibition is accessible to a wide audience, including visually or hearing­impaired visitors and wheelchair users.  Since its founding in 1936, the Van Abbemuseum has taken an experimental approach to the questions it poses on     the relationship between art and society. Many of the 3,000 plus artworks in the museum’s collection came into being on the fringes of society. Places of tension, where artists are compelled to examine and to create. Presented largely in chronological order and with an emphasis on the personal perspective, the art in Delinking  and  Relinking  tells of unexpected encounters, associated ideas and ideals throughout the world, of differing positions within the     same society and of what connects people. The exhibition consists of three main Chapters, each on a different floor.  The basement level houses a prologue on the museum’s history and an epilogue with work by Lily van der Stokker, a nod to the privileges but particularly the burdens of being an artist.

Chapter 1, on the ground floor, displays pieces dating from the first half of the twentieth century: a period in which  artists left, rediscovered and sometimes reinvented their homeland.  Cuba’s  Wifredo  Lam  and  Spain’s  Pablo Picasso, for example, met in Paris, where the Argentine Alicia Penalba studied under the Russian Ossip Zadkine. Together, they sought ways of giving expression to their feelings and ideas, yet these were informed by very diverse traditions and experiences. Such encounters show how views on art evolved through a dialogue between European  and non­European perspectives. This chapter also includes works by Marc Chagall, Joan Miró and El Lissitzky. Chapter 2, on the first floor, covers the 1960s, ‘70s and ‘80s. These were decades during which Dutch society was reinventing itself against a backdrop of reconstruction, decolonisation and the Cold War. Among the display items is      a video installation by Wendelien van Oldenborgh on a 1970 experimental housing project in Eindhoven by architect Frans van Klingeren. Van Klingeren designed the community building without any internal walls, meaning that the school, shop, library and café were all open plan. The idea was that this would lead to a better, more conscious communal existence. The video installation shows the history of this building, in which walls were gradually erected. The third Chapter displays artworks dating from the 1990s to the present day. Racial inequality, climate change,    gender and sexual identity lead the agenda. The artists in this Chapter share a fascination for life on our planet, and      a longing to learn about what preceded it. These artists invite us to ponder the world of today and that of tomorrow.    The Proud Rebels gallery, named after the work by Patricia Kaersenhout, makes quite an impression. This gallery is dedicated to the success of women who fight for their own and others’ emancipation.  The pursuit  of  justice  and  a more equitable society are key themes in the works of Sanja Iveković, Gülsün Karamustafa, Marlene Dumas and Iris Kensmil. This Chapter also features many  new  acquisitions,  including  the  video  “Dit”  Learn by Laure Prouvost, the film “Toxic by Boudry / Lorenz and tapestry, The Captive: Here’s A Heart For Every Fate” by, Mercedez Azpilicueta.

Participating artists: Tjong Ang, Willem Adams, Karel Appel, Rasheed Araeen, Mercedes Azpilicueta, Gam Bodenhausen, Boudry / Lorenz, stanley brouwn, Jean Brusselmans, Marc Chagall, Chryssa, Céline Condorelli, René Daniëls, Hanne Darboven, Ad Dekkers, Rineke Dijkstra, Marlene Dumas, Max Ernst, Lucio Fontana, Nilbar Güreş, Lubaina Himid, Isaac Israëls, Sanja Iveković, Patricia Kaersenhout, Gülsün Karamustafa, Karrabing Film Collective, Toon Kelder, Iris Kensmil, John Körmeling, Theo Kuijpers, Wifredo Lam, Fernand Léger, El Lissitzky, Lucebert, Joan Miró, László Moholy Nagy, Piet Mondriaan, Nabuurs&VanDoorn, Ahmet Ögüt, Otobong Nkanga, Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Rodan Omomá, Gabriel Orozsco, Pieter Ouborg, Alicia Penalba, Constant Permeke, Stijn Peeters, Pablo Picasso, Wim van der Plas, Marjetica Potrc, Laure Prouvost, Michael Rakowitz, Gé Röling, Wilhelm Sasnal, Jan Schoonhoven, Ad Snijders, Mariëlle Soons, Pieter Stoop, Lily van der Stokker, Ellie Strik, Koki Tanaka, Charley Toorop, Roy Villevoye, Evi Vingerling, Henk Visch, Friedrich Vordemberge-Gildewart, Ossip Zadkine and Qui Zhijie

Photo: Exhibition view: Delinking and Relinking In the Van Abbemuseum Collection, Abbe Museum, Eindhoven, 2021-25, Photo: Joep Jacobs, Courtesy Abbe Museum

Info: Curators: Charles Esche, Diana Franssen, Steven ten Thije, Van Abbe Museum, Stratumsedijk 2, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, Duration: 17/9/2021-1/7/2025, Days & Hours: Tue-Sun 11:00-17:00, https://vanabbemuseum.nl/