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still from The High and the Low
On the east side of the city of Amsterdam, in Spinozastraat, Kleine Wittenburgerstraat and Het Laagt, Welcome Stranger popped up last summer. Welcome Stranger develops artworks in unexpected places, not in an institutional context, which are also experimental in nature for the artists involved. No white cubes but art in everyday life.
Since 2020, a meandering line of new temporary works has been forming in public space, starting from the artist's home, on facades and roofs - with works by Bastienne Kramer, Simon Wald-Lasowky and Lily van der Stokker, among others. Walks and meet-ups involve the public more intensively with the works, often in conversation with the artist. It not only produces works of art, it makes you as passer-by and visitor think about the interaction between the personal and the strange, about your place in this world and the place of artists in the capital. The meandering line is intended to continue, annually and for at least 100 days each time.
ABOUT THE ARTWORKS, MEET-UPS AND REACTIONS
SARAH VAN SONSBEECK (1976), SPINOZASTRAAT 9 had a light opposite her house on Spinoza Street shout ‘Keep up the good work!’ in Morse code. In ‘Keep Up the Good Work’, Van Sonsbeeck managed to capture that one second in which the wink of the light beam comes to you. If the blinking light catches your eye, you come into connection with encouragement that is timeless and indiscriminate. Which can be found always and everywhere.
JACOB DWYER (1988), AT KLEINE WITTENBURGERSTRAAT 315 made a bright green speaking tube through which, as a passer-by, you hear the musings of a creature upstairs, in his house. You can hear him eating chips between monologues. During one of the meet-ups, there was a girl, about 9 years old, standing with her parents. Her father indicated that the girl had a question she wanted to ask. After a few seconds, she gathered the courage to speak and said, ‘What happened to the dog?’. Jacob had no idea what she was talking about and stood there confused and replied, ‘I'm not sure what happened to the dog.' This seemed to be enough for her for that moment. Jacob later spoke to the parents and learn that she questioned a very specific moment in the script in which Jacob talks about throwing wasabi nuts from his balcony at the neighbour's dog downstairs. They ask how long the script is in total. ‘50 minutes’ Jacob said. In that case, they explain, they have probably listened to at least two-thirds of it. They stop for a few minutes each day and listen while walking to the girl's school. We were so happy to hear this!
At another meet-up, Michiel Huijben, board member of the BPW (Bond Precaire Woonvormen) talks a little about the BPW and how it stands up for the housing rights of people living in temporary, insecure or overpriced housing. His lecture contextualises the voice within the housing crisis. That afternoon focused on how people unite to solve things together. Through this togetherness, change and stability become more achievable. Michiel's talk flows seamlessly into a group discussion, provoking some fun conversations that eventually turn into scattered anecdotes about housing problems over a beer. Inevitably, everyone has a story and we leave a microphone in the mailbox and ask people to share their story by speaking it through the flap. We create a sonic document that lives on after the work is deinstalled.
Artists KRISTINA BENJOCKI (1981) AND STIJN VERHOEFF (1981), LIVE IN HET LAAGT 24. They made a film for Welcome Stranger about their neighbourhood, Het Hoogt and Het Laagt. You see images of the birds, the trees and the houses. People on their way to work, school, the shopping centre. Or sitting and playing in and on one of the many playgrounds. Nearby, you can hear the sounds of the neighbourhood. And at the bottom of the image you can see the text messages Benjocki and Verhoeff send each other while working on this film about their neighbourhood.
MORE ABOUT WELCOME STRANGER
At Welcome Stranger, it's like ‘acupunt cure’ see someone this summer: deliberate pinpricks are made in places where you know there will be a broadening effect somewhere in the body - in this case, a street, a city district, and sometimes maybe even further. It's about collaboration, between artist and curator, artist and residents, involved businesses and visitors, with preferably as open a presentation model as possible.
Welcome Stranger 2024 took place from 1 June to 15 September. You can find the three artworks we added this summer below, as well as reactions from passers-by and visitors. Writers from De Groene Amsterdammer, de Volkskant and het Parool visited the artworks, you can also find the reviews below.
REVIEWS
