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Dimitri van den Wittenboer (1989) creates long-term, socially engaged art projects revolving around community building and co-creation. His environments facilitate radical sharing, collective ownership, and self-organization. He is thus searching for ways to counteract the rising individualism and alienation resulting from capitalism. To achieve this, he intentionally works outside the artworld and selects locations that are at the heart of society for his performative interventions. The installation Home (2024-2025) at Prospects is obviously an exception to this rule. However, this work does offer us an excellent insight into Van den Wittenboer’s world and artistic practice.
The installation consists of simple furnishings – bed, table, lamp, chair, laptop, and a couple of books – that are symbolic for basic human needs like safety and housing. Over the past years, Van den Wittenboer’s work has increasingly moved towards the theme of migration and the experiences of undocumented people. In this context the idea of home has ambiguous connotations as it means something entirely different to people who have lost their home. On a daily basis, Van den Wittenboer activates the installation at Prospects with short performances during which he shares notes from his diary and excerpts from books that inspire him. The space invites visitors to reflect and encounter.
Last year, in Belgium, the artist embarked on a doctoral research programme to study the ethics and aesthetics of politically engaged art. How can art and activism enhance each other? And what does love have to do with it? The work Home serves as a first exploration of questions like these.
Text: Esmee Postma
Translated from Dutch by Marie Louise Schoondergang (The Art of Translation)