Civil Crop

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The works brought together in this exhibition reflect each artist’s extended research, which they have been developing during their studies at the Master Artistic Research department of the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague. The works span different disciplines – from video, installation and sculpture to performance – each emerging from a specific artistic interest and a set of critical questions the artists have been exploring within the department. The department offers advanced support for research-based creative enquiry. It is for artists who wish to explore how artistic-intellectual work can enrich their response to our complex present. Built on trust and care, the small department places value on structured peer learning and group work. Parallel to the presented works, the exhibition reflects on its site by fostering expanded relationships with the outside.

You can take a bus you never take.
You can press the stop but not get off.
You can make a guess and not be right.
To the left instead, and another turn,
around the next corner.
You can take a chance and have it not pay off.

You can take a bus you never take.
Stop. Right there. In between the
Here and the Over-there.
You can press the stop but not get off.
You can make a guess and not be right.
You can take a chance and have
it not pay off.

This will be your entry point.
Now, look closer.

Wheels turn. Breaks scream. Bodies lean and
bounce back to standing. Bodies pivot.

Images spin and thoughts return wearing different names. What looks like repetition may be rehearsal. And what looks like a loop may be a line. May be. For every rotation carries a fraction of distance.

The bus you take is the one
that never arrives.

It is in that ongoing stretch of time we travel. Funneled back and forth through rhythms that accelerate, stagnate in that acceleration, accelerate in that stagnation, and emerge onto a next phase of the same game.

We meet within patterns that presuppose one another. Patterns love company. Temporary encounters detune and retune us. In the same buzz, we resonate, thinking we are still.


⟼ Project supervisor: Prof. Babak Afrassiabi