Categorizing my Archive – an improvisation
Paulien Oltheten
06.12.2019
This month artist Paulien Oltheten started with an inventory of her work from the past 15 years: videos, texts, photos and drawings. Her idea is to make an inventory because she starts to lose the overview. She has already noticed that during the first steps of cleaning up and sorting there are a lot of untold stories and anecdotes lying between the stacks, leaflets, objects and scriptures. She will make a structured overview of the archive and enumerate it in inventory lists, but she has her doubts as to whether she can or should categorize her work. And if so, how then?
During this evening she leads the audience through the first finds from her archive and the corresponding considerations. An associative story arises in which story, matter, form and structure blend together.
As one of the last contributing artists to De Fluyt en de Hoi, Oltheten’s presentation will also help us to think about the futurity of one’s year long institutional program as a whole. What is its afterlife? When does its production stop? Where do we trace continuity? After the presentation Oltheten will exhibit a selection of her photographs and prints from her archive in our space until the end of 2019. From 2020 documentation of this presentation can be found in our developing library.
Paulien Oltheten studied at the Rijksakademie, Amsterdam, and in 2013 she was a resident artist at ISCP, New York. In 2017 she worked at Cité des Arts in Paris. Performances include: PAC Milan (2018); Jeu de Paume, Paris (2017); De Buren, Brussels (2016); Fondatione Ratti, Como (2015); KW, Berlin (2015); NCCA Moscow (2015); Helmhaus Zurich (2015); IDFA Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (2014); Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2014); Vera List Center New York (2013); De Brakkegrond Amsterdam (2011); SMBA Amsterdam (2007). Exhibitions include: Les Rencontres de la photographie d'Arles (2018); Where do we go from here, Annet Gelink/Ellen de Bruijne Gallery, Amsterdam (2017); The measure of our travelling feet, Marres (2016); Paulien Oltheten & Anouk Kruithof, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2014); Off Walking, MoCP Chicago (2013); Desire Lines, ACCA Melbourne (2013); It’s my imagination you know, Gallery Fons Welters Amsterdam (2012); Walk on a line…, Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam (2011); Kitbag questions, Dvir Gallery Tel Aviv (2011); De Volkskrant Beeldende Kunst Prijs, Stedelijk Museum Schiedam (2010); Portscapes, Boijmans van Beuningen Rotterdam (2010); Off the Record, Proposal for Municipal Art Acquisitions, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2009).