In Shortcut (2025), a filmic triptych by Maaike Meindertsma (1999), a woman carrying a blue suitcase walks towards the horizon. She ploughs through the slippery silt of the Ems, crosses the blazing salt flats of Tunisia, and moves through cold, snow-covered fields in Germany. She appears to be heading purposefully towards a destination, but what that destination is – and where it lies – is never revealed: the journey through three distinct landscapes unfolds as an endless passage.
In her work, Meindertsma examines the interplay between body and environment, and the ways in which both mind and body store movement. This fascination draws on her many years of experience in gymnastics. In Shortcut, she explores specific themes such as waiting and haste. Walking without a fixed destination can be understood as a form of waiting: a meditative act in which expansive landscapes – much like those in the Romantic paintings of Caspar David Friedrich – reflect the figure’s state of mind. But the work remains open to multiple interpretations. The vast landscape may be read as a refuge for pursuing dreams; the journey can evoke people on the move, while the shifting terrains may also be seen as a reflection on a destabilized climate. Ultimately, the meaning of the journey is in the eye of the beholder.
Written by Esther Darley