Loading
...

mind

virtual nap space

essay

Take what you’re owed // Fugitive Dreams

Marly Pierre-Louis    Sondi   

Imagine falling asleep whenever and wherever – this is love, I think, this is freedom.

read more
virtual nap space

essay

Productively Unproductive

Arne Willée    Milo Sharafeddine   

Arne Willée rescues idleness from its morally dubious past and presents it as a needed, critical resource.

read more
on hosting

column

The Guest at Work

helena grande    Geke Zaal   

Twice a day you walk up a mountain to connect to the internet, check your matches on Hinge, and text the girl you like from your language class back in the country you live. 

read more

essay

Cyberpunk Diaspora

Shirley Au    Kongkee   

Reconciling with Hong Kong in Kongkee’s “Dragon’s Delusion”

read more

essay

Traces of past lives: an attempt at capturing balloons

Iris Cuppen    Martin Groch   

“Can I write about the balloon without attaching too much weight to it? Or is a balloon just a balloon; enough said?”

read more

essay

When fear rules — a conversation about silence in the Dutch art world

Lieneke Hulshof   

A conversation with Mirjam Westen, Tina Farifteh and Maurits de Bruijn on the current possibilities of talking to each other as a society – through visual arts – about the ongoing genocide in Palestine.

read more

fiction

Ötza and the Open-Ended Becoming of the World

Levi van Gelder    Mitchel Peters   

Confessions of a Cryodesiccated Fanfiction Entrepreneur From the Neolithic.

read more

essay

Where the Magic Happens

Katherina Gorodynska    Geke Zaal   

I find a room in the basement and a room in the attic and while sifting through these rooms, I realise that the room of my dreams has always been a room to work in.

read more

essay

A neon palindrome, lessons from the crouching man

Charlie Jermyn    Mel Keane   

“In the name of contemporary art, Spain has finally embraced the whitewash technique of the iconoclasts.“

read more
mystics

essay

Ghosthood and the Uncomfortable Familiarity of Haunting

Milo Sharafeddine   

now you tell me I remind you of a friend, but one that you can't seem to name

read more
digital zine

interview

Gaydreaming

Sarath Muralidharan    Mijali Posada   

Welcome to the Gaydreaming henny.

read more
on hosting

column

and then we danced, on hosting ghosts and ghosting

Eva Susova    Geke Zaal   

In my dance, I host ghosts, their multi-headed presence, their sounding breath coming out of their numerous mouths. I befriend the strange, and the otherness becomes my condition.

read more
digital zine

essay

How the hero became my problem

Leto Keunen   

Deconstructing traditional notions of masculinity and conflict, exploring a fluidity in defence.

read more
digital zine

feature

Rethinking Conquest: An Anti-Amazon Conversation

Natali Aguirre Montaña    Daniela Pinillos Collazos   

I am the city, I am a daughter of the city.
Not the rain, neither the forest.
Further from being the rainforest’s daughter.

read more
digital zine

essay

Sisyphus in the Era of Simulation

Léane Gorgette   

Reflections on The Sims game and its entanglement in the mystification of an oppressive and recursive power system.

read more
digital zine

essay

Babe… It’s Time to Get a Haircut

Derrick Crichlow    Bung   

In what way is fading a means of internally & externally bending “dreams” beyond the black barbershop?

read more
digital zine

essay

singing about bananas

Marie-Lu}ise{ Charlotte Weier    Savio Banholzer   

A banana bread without Chiquita bananas and without a guilty conscience would taste even better.

read more
digital zine

essay

What did you dream about last night?

Jonghoo Jeong   

When we dream and interpret the dream, is it really a dream that predicts the future, or is our subconscious making us believe that the dream predicted the future? 

read more
mystics

essay

Dasha’s Kitchen: My magical grilled cheese sandwich recipe

Dasha Ilina    Naomi Hettiarachchige–Hubèrt   

Dasha Ilina tricks the search algorithms that might read her essay about algorithmic surveillance into thinking it’s just a recipe for a grilled cheese sandwich.

read more

essay

The Image of an Image is a Memory: Clash of the Imperial Gaze

Bhavneet Kaur    Maria Vorobjova   

Today, a walk in the museum is a walk with a camera. Is the hegemonic narrative of the exhibition questioned by the camera? Or does the camera become an accomplice to the museum?

read more

feature

Under the Spell of the Sensuous: What David Abram’s Environmental Philosophy Can Teach Us

Hannah Pezzack    Anja Kaiser   

“We can navigate the intricate workings of the planet without the need for absolute mastery, embracing uncertainty and opening ourselves to unexpected insights and interlocutors, be they human or more-than.“

read more

fiction

I Become You

Isa Mazzei    Hussein Shikha   

“I love your face. I guess if I had to look at it every day, it wouldn’t be the worst.”

read more

interview

Farzané & Arash: Artificial Acoustemology

Loes de Boer    Farzané    Arash Akbari   

"The question that piques my curiosity is not whether machines can exhibit human creativity, but rather to explore how human-machine interactions can lead to the development of aesthetics or epistemologies that are based on the combined agency of both entities."

read more

fiction

The New Build: A Companion Haunting

Leigh Alexander    Alice Guerin   

That was the top-rated post on Raising, the occult AI forum where Nessa had found the instructions to build Robin 3. Raising was an “occult” group as in secret and illegal uses of language models, not as in black magic, Nessa was pretty sure.

read more

essay

Thinking through the supermarket

Ilaria Obata    Maria Vorobjova   

Ilaria Obata takes a fresh look at the vast environment of the supermarket chain in this analytical essay. 

read more

fiction

Full Nine Seconds

Sarp Sozdinler    Martin Groch   

Bug wondered if any part of him, any itty-bitty projection of his future self, had objected to the goings-on during the fall and wished to rewind in midair.

read more

essay

A devilish grin, a suburban carpark

Charlie Jermyn    Kalle Mattsson   

Essayist and poet Charlie Jermyn makes a do-it-yourself pilgrimage through museum, muck, rain, wind and pub to visit Jan Steen’s old haunts

read more

letter

A letter from my couch

Maia Kenney    Angelina Nikolayeva   

2023 in review, and a few hints on what’s in store for The Couch in 2024.

read more

poetry

The horizon shifts as I do

Eleni Maragkou    Milo Sharafeddine   

Did you know that sequoia trees can grow taller than data centres can?
In the outskirts of Amsterdam, there are many of the latter, corrupting the horizon.

read more

fiction

Camp Connection: An Intimacy Ritual Horror Story

Leigh Alexander    Alice Guerin   

“Maye couldn’t take her eyes off Kevin Commitment. He was just so tight and shiny.”

read more

essay

In The Door Opening of The Bedroom

Zazie Duinker    Maria Vorobjova   

'The bedroom is the locus of a becoming, spread out across multiple dimensions. Every night, as I close my bedroom door behind me, this process is set in motion, and every morning, just as it is about to become actualised, it disappears.'

read more

fiction

Lungs

Isa Mazzei    Hussein Shikha   

Cassidy works at Jazzy's Afterlife Relations, a theater where customers can talk to deceased loved ones. However, when dismembered body parts begin appearing on stage, Cassidy is tasked with cleaning up the mess…

read more

fiction

The Glass Age

Brianna Leatherbury    Martin Groch   

Suddenly, a muffled bang pierced the room. It travelled over the aisles in a shock wave, coating the walls in a shallow echo. A thick silence followed, cut only by the hiss of the refrigerators.

read more

interview

'When you mourn, everything is included'

Leendert Sonnevelt    Françoise Bolechowski   

Asa Horvitz unearths the many layers of GHOST: his poignant performance project on death and its presence among the living.

read more

essay

Talent Programmes: Entry Points and Ecosystems

Hannah Pezzack   

Music journalist Hannah Pezzack dives into the nuances of building a career within the cultural sector, investigating mentorship offered by European festivals, platforms, and institutions, including Het HEM.

read more

essay

The Moment You Discover Eyelashes

Laure van den Hout    Isadora Goudsblom   

“This is what I want to remember: ‘Repetition is a form of change’. But I’m not sure whether I think this is lame or actually holds a profound truth.”

read more
mystics

essay

Are TikTok Healers Contemporary Quacks or Re-risen Witches*?

Fedora Boonaert    Rustan Söderling   

Are the countless self-proclaimed ‘healers’ giving medical advice on TikTok quacks? Or are they a sign that witches* have reclaimed their space in the health field, reviving lost knowledge and offering the care that mainstream healthcare still fails to provide?

read more
check-in

mind

Check-in with... Stéphanie Janaina

Berber Meindertsma   

Berber Meindertsma speaks with dancer and choreographer Stéphanie Janaina, almost four years after she performed ¡miércoles! at Het HEM.

read more
check-in

mind

Check-in with… HMTP talents and coaches 

Berber Meindertsma   

After the music video release Vamos by KG and Fabs, a track written during the Homebase Music Talent Programme (HMTP) Writer’s Camp, Berber Meindertsma speaks with them and two of the coaches of the camp.

read more

fiction

The Hotel Corpus: A (data) body horror story

Leigh Alexander    Alice Guerin   

“How much data about herself would she have to provide before the stupid machines could understand who she truly was, what she truly wanted?”

read more
new hhhorizons

profile

Against the Logic of Efficiency

Andrew Pasquier   

BUTT Magazine editor Andrew Pasquier explores how Horst Arts and Music Festival has challenged traditional festival organisation by prioritising innovation and creativity.

read more

interview

Atelier Brenda: Thinking Beyond The Format

Melisa Cenik    Ines Bodlovic   

We explore the minds behind our identity for The Couch, which is made by Belgium-based design studio Atelier Brenda, run and founded by Sophie Keij and Nana Esi. With a growing portfolio and many experiences in the art and music world, they are ready to conquer the world.

read more
new hhhorizons

interview

The Alchemical World of Dooha Ritus

Agrî Ibrahim    Angelina Nikolayeva    Aya Zahra   

In anticipation of New HHHorizons, Het HEM’s second collaboration with HORST, Agrî Ibrahim sits down with  Woody92, Armia Yousefi and Arad Inbar ahead of the first instalment of their ever-expanding performance, Dooha Ritus.

read more
check-in

interview

Check-in with... Wil Spier

Berber Meindertsma    Mayte Breed   

“If people are interested, they understand everything in the world. The problem is getting them interested.”

read more

column

Noa’s Advice: How To Stand Out

Noa-Marthe Prins   

If artistic production (within the artworld) is tied to individual mystique and brilliance — then how the hell are we supposed to stand out if the Netherlands alone produces such a vulgarly deflating abundance of artists?

read more
mystics

interview

Terrestrial Technologies: An Interview with Patricia Domínguez

Mirla Klijn    Emma Llorente Palacio   

"If you look beyond their corporate functionality, these bodies are all going to the Earth to be repaired from damage by a system that never stops."

read more
check-in

interview

Check-in with... Sara Koops

Berber Meindertsma   

Ever wondered what boxing is all about, and what art might have to do with it? Sit back and enjoy this check-in with professional boxer Sara Koops, who participated in the Chapter 1NE Box clinic at Het HEM in 2019.

read more

column

You Gotta Serve Somebody

Ben Shai van der Wal    Kalle Mattsson   

“Hello” I typed, and it felt like flinging sound into a cave, testing to see if someone was there in the dark, some being of an undetermined image. 

read more

poetry

Between the columns we reckon with it all

Pembroke King   

All metal and grass, golden hour reeds upon the canals North Sea winds making small gods of us all

read more

fiction

Cup Run Over

Clementine Edwards    Maria Vorobjova   

smiling my best smile I asked him what sort of work he was in, my eyes moving down to the cup in his hand.

read more
check-in

mind

Check-in with... Maarten Spruyt

Berber Meindertsma    Blanka Gyulai   

We sat down and looked back with Guest of Chapter 3HREE Maarten Spruyt, known for his work as a curator, art director and stylist, with an incredible knack for beauty and sensory perception. "I try to make exhibitions which make you look inwards, feel uncomfortable and sit with that for a moment."

read more

poetry

Remember me, remember you

Ko van 't Hek    Isadora Goudsblom   

"It’s strange not seeing each other for a while. I know there isn’t any other way, but it’s strange. I hope I’ll still recognise you, after the renovation."

read more
mystics

essay

Mystics of the Chthulucene

Maia Kenney    Rustan Söderling   

Cthulhu – H.P. Lovecraft’s science fiction monster – lurks under the surface of the ocean as an elemental deity. We must wonder what lurks beneath the surface of the systems known as AI.

read more

essay

Two Nights of Noise at Tivoli

Charlie Jermyn    Kalle Mattsson   

By recounting his experiences of two formative concerts at Tivoli, essayist and performer Charlie Jermyn provides a poetic account on the raw power of sound and the music of everyday life. He connects the origin of noise music to Italian Futurism, a movement fascinated with dynamism and constant innovation, and appreciates the ongoing vitality of aging cultural icons amidst the decay of our time.

read more

column

You Wanna Know How We Got These Scars?

Ben Shai van der Wal    Kalle Mattsson   

Writer, cultural critic, and philosopher Ben Shai van der Wal calls upon us to embrace our trickster-friend. A short essay about how society’s need for healing and fixing stands in the way of it.

read more

column

Noa’s Advice

Noa-Marthe Prins   

There’s no such thing as a stupid [art] question - Noa knows it all.

read more

fiction

The Boys Next To Her House

John Collins McCormick    Maria Vorobjova   

"I thought about a cold beer and cigarettes in the garage. I’d kill for that."

read more

fiction

Mademoiselle de Sade

Mehmet Süzgün    Maria Vorobjova   

"She cleaned him, made him pray; she ate him violently like a fat pig enjoying its last meal."

read more
mystics

essay

POV:

Ginevra Petrozzi    Rustan Söderling   

Ginevra Petrozzi makes the case for a complicated relationship between ourselves and the artificial intelligence tools that guide us through our lives. The stories and myths we construct around the technologies we don’t understand can help us navigate the obscure and even violent power of artificial intelligence.

read more
on hosting

essay

Hospitality on demand

Berber Meindertsma   

Can the concept of hospitality provide us with a critical lens to explore what kind of relationships socially engaged art institutions can build online ?

read more
check-in

interview

Check-in with... Bert Spaan

Who or what is the contemporary cartographer? Bert Spaan (Shock Forest Group) reflects on his residency in 2019.

read more

letter

An Introduction to The Couch

Kim Tuin   

"Meanwhile, the idea that we had – that the digital is a free space where anything is possible – has shattered into little pieces."

read more

interview

Re:Sounding

Orpheu De Jong    Rieke Vos   

In 2022, researchers Pamela Jordan and Sergio González Cuervo brought their sonic archaeology project Re:Sounding to our site. "Het HEM presents potent questions, questions that wouldn't come up had we not been thinking about the space through sound, through our perception of it and the perception of the building’s original users."

read more