Project: Pink Prison
Artists: Afra Eisma & Kubilay Mert Ural
For the project Pink Prison, artists Afra Eisma en Kubilay Mert Ural join forces for the creation of a miniature city carved out of found materials like cardboard boxes and plastic bottles. The city looks cute and playful at first, but detailed scenes in the streets and shop windows create a dystopian atmosphere.
Residency: 20 July - 20 August 2022
Opening: Sat. 20 August, 14:00-18:00
Exhibition: 20 August - 17 September 2022
*opening hours: Thu-Sat, 13:00-17:00
Finissage: Sat. 17 Sept. - 14:00-18:00
On the occasion of the finissage of Pink Prison, singer Ciska Ruitenberg initiates an Instant Choir. While moving through the building, we fill the chapel with improvised sounds that are inspired by the installation by Afra Eisma and Kubilay Mert Ural. The Instant Choir welcomes everyone who likes to sing, but you don't have to be able to do anything special. Singers and listeners are equally important; you can also participate without using your voice. Together we form a shared body and create music collectively.
Pink Prison is a metaphor for repressed feelings and imposed attitudes the artists are confronted with in their daily life. The complexity of a city that is brimming with life and possibilities can also be demanding and overwhelming. Not everything is as rosy as it seems; sometimes we get stuck in the illusion of a sweet color. Artists, among many other precarious bodies in our harsh society, constantly navigate between fear and comfort but are constantly required to remain approachable, facilitate playfulness and mimic freedom - which is actually very strained, constructed and strategically planned.
The total size of the installation is around 50 square meter and invites you to hover around its uncanny narratives and mysterious aura. Presented in the chapel space, the high ceiling and the large arched windows are designed to make you feel small and humble, while the miniature city makes you feel big and in control by observing it from a bird's eye perspective. It poses the question: What if someone is also observing you from above as well? This double effect creates a play with scales and triggers to rethink free will and control, surveillance and power relations.
During the residency, Afra and Kubilay add another layer to the experience of their dystopian city. By driving a remote controlled toy car with a camera attached to the roof, they will film the city from street level. The video will be shown in the cinema of HMK, where the city you just carefully observed will unfold completely differently, leaving you without the control you thought you just obtained.
*This project is an iteration of Pink Prison as shown in Afra Eisma’s studio from 14 to 17 july 2022 and has been made possible with help of Mondriaan Fonds, Gemeente Hoorn and Stroom Den Haag.
Afra Eisma construes intimate worlds that burst with color and energy. While studying at the Royal Academy of Arts (2012-2017) and Central Saint Martins (2016), she developed a multidisciplinary practice to express personal stories that result in immersive, radiant and tactile installations. She often uses traditional craft techniques in novel ways, such as tapestries, sculptures and ceramics. Recurring themes in her work are embodiment and generosity among and between bodies, inviting viewers to use their imagination to infuse the sensuality encapsulated in her work with whimsy lightheartedness.
Kubilay Mert Ural studied performing arts managment in Istanbul (2005 - 2010) before moving to The Netherlands to study at the Sandberg Institute (2012-2013) and the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten (2017-2018). His artistic career started with performing arts as a musician and gradually moved into the field of figurative painting, installations and video. The uncanny nature of his work is based on his obsession with making the familiar unfamiliar, the ordinary extraordinary and vice versa - creating a dream-like state influenced by the primate self. Storytelling is a key element in his work, which he often uses to address politics and mob psychology.