The New Zealand Artist Ilke Gers (1981), living in Rotterdam, makes installations, performances and publications in which movement, behavior, social and spatial conditions play a role.

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Stichting NDSM-werf asked Ilke Gers to temporarily intervene in the outdoor area of the NDSM-wharf, where a structure of rules and laws — unlike other public places in the Netherlands — is largely missing. Gers looked at the NDSM shipyard beforehand to see what behavior, use and actions are taking place. By working with a 'script' for chalk lines, she came to a temporary visual work. Has the current era changed her view of the behavior and use of public space? The lines were visible until traffic movements or weather prevailed and the work faded. Ilke Gers' outlines, which are normally used for sports fields, made other forms of play, actions and meanings possible in response to the 'public' nature of the NDSM shipyard.

She described her way of working as “site-sensitive” instead of site-specific, where it was important to her how a space feels, what behavior determines and shapes a space. The focus was on its porous aspect. To elements you may not be aware of at first glance.

'Flipping the Bird' was a photographic work by visual artist Jaap Scheeren (1979). Three images of nature were exhibited on 6 x 3 meter billboards spread across the NDSM shipyard. This photo project held up a mirror to the viewer and showed how we related to nature in both a very serious and absurd way.

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Whoever went to the northern banks of the IJ encountered a number of rebellious animals. A rat, a swan, a squirrel raising their middle fingers: Scheeren created a world where he followed his own logic, intuition, and rules, always with a humorous twist. With the photo works in public spaces, at the NDSM shipyard and around the Tolhuistuin, the photographer told a story about a person who wanted to make contact with nature. The absurdist images, which also appeared earlier in Het Parool appeared, from October 17, were shown on large construction boards (6 x 3 meters) at various locations on the NDSM shipyard. The title of the work referred to looking at animals and nature differently, but also to the English slang for “raise your middle finger”. Jaap Scheeren: “My goal was to become aware of people's position in relation to nature. How did we naturally become part of it again?”

Scheeren's exhibition was the first in the new program series 'NDSM Billboards', with which the NDSM-werf Foundation provided space for artists on large construction boards: “In addition to the building signs on the western part of the NDSM, we gave artists the opportunity to post their artistic statements on building boards. With its 10 hectares, the shipyard provided a beautiful background for large images. In addition to established names, we also wanted to give young talent a chance on the billboards to make their work highly visible to Amsterdam in response to the context of the NDSM,” says curator Petra Heck.

From Wednesday, October 21 to Sunday, October 25, 2020, the NDSM shipyard hosted a temporary project called 'Because the Night', consisting of two works of art by light artists Boris Acket and Vladimir Grafov. The light installation was an ode to ADE — the events that normally breathed so much life into Amsterdam's night, but were forced to stay a little quieter in 2020. The works could be admired from many points of view, but especially special to see up close, here at the NDSM shipyard.

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Light and sound artist Boris Acket (1988), known for his lighting works at DGTL Festival, created the lighting work 'BAKEN'. In a rudderless time, this installation, created in collaboration with Chris van Meer, Lumus Instruments, Ampco Flashlight, brought Think! AV & Van Ham Tenten and Podia, a little sigh of relief, a sign of life. The light 'beat' softly in the rhythm of a heartbeat, like a lighthouse. Anyone who watched the work from a distance could see the heartbeat without hearing it. For example, the work emphasized the deafening silence of ADE 2020 and literally and figuratively encouraged the night and festival sector and all Amsterdammers. The work was meant to be a relaxing spot on the horizon — seen from different places — but those who experienced 'BEAKEN' up close could actually hear the heart beating softly. Especially for ADE, the heart rate was built from the kicks (bass drums) of the most used drum computers in dance music.

The second work of 'Because the Night' was by light artist Vladimir Grafov (1964), who used lasers in his installation 'Invincible Sun' to create an abstract and autonomous interplay of lines on the Y-slope where ships used to roll into the IJ. The laser lights, inextricably linked to the atmosphere and decor of dance parties, formed the basis for his work and depicted how daylight gave way to the light of the night after sunset. In his work, Grafov linked science and technology to create new experiences in the field of form, color and sound.

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'Because the Night' took place at the same time as NDSM Music Digital x ADE 2020, where a music program was broadcast live on stream for five days. During these five days, the audience was able to watch and listen to more than 50 hours of top artists, labels and the latest talents in house and techno music. Due to the new measures, Covid-19-proof digital dance parties were organized to dance together from the living room by videoconferencing worldwide.

When the reins were allowed to loosen again in the summer of 2020 as part of the measures concerning the Corona pandemic, we were happy to be able to open with the Zomerwerf. By spatial design agency Offenders W a multi-functional grid was designed for the Load Out at NDSM. Within this grid, space was created for sports and games, picnics, small-scale performances, not to mention our NDSM citygardens. Another part was the first basketball court of 3X3 Units at NDSM and the tournament they organized this specific summer. Another striking element was the punching bag by Boogieland, so that people could (kick) box outdoors. We, Stichting NDSM-werf, were glad that, with all the space we had 'left over', we were able to give something to the city.

In June of that year, at the initiative of Jur Jacobs and the Slow Food Youth Network Netherlands in cooperation with Foundation Together Against Food Waste 20,000 kilos of potatoes poured out at the shipyard. Via the Too Good To Go app, Amsterdammers were able to come and make beepers at the Load Out, near Pllek, for a moment. The action was a great success and the mountain was gone by the end of the afternoon. We suspect that a lot of fries, stews and potato gratins were eaten last week.

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Slow Food Youth Network (SFYN) is an international youth movement that works for a good and fair food system. The organization believes that young people should play an important role in the future of food production and consumption. That's why they're trying to bring young consumers, producers, farmers, chefs and students closer together. They do this through eat-ins, tastings and events such as World Disco Soup Day. “Together, we need to work on a more resilient food system where less food is wasted, farmers get a fair price and where good food is available for everyone,” says Lianne de Bie, director of Slow Food Youth Network Netherlands.

There was a nice mix of people: from Old Northerners to people with Teslas from't Gooi.

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The organization was very satisfied with the turnout of a very diverse audience and estimated that potatoes were sold to more than 600 people in Amsterdam, spread across the day. Co-initiator Jur Jacobs: “What I personally liked the most is that there was a nice mix of audiences, from Old Northerners to people with Teslas from't Gooi. All ages, origins and groups were present.”

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Last Saturday's action is not an isolated one. There are many surpluses of food in the Netherlands, it's not just about the potatoes that have been saved from waste. The Samen Tegen Voedselverspilling Foundation wants to create more awareness about food waste in general: “In the Netherlands, there are surpluses due to COVID-19 right now, while large parts of Africa are facing imminent hunger. This is something we need to solve together,” says Toine Timmermans, director of the Samen Tegen Voedselverspilling Foundation.

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The NDSM-werf Foundation believes the underlying problem is very important and is pleased that it has been able to contribute to raising awareness about this theme. In addition, the organization has the ambition to become a testing ground with the shipyard for sustainability, circularity and greening, also in relation to the city and a half meter. Over the past few weeks, the foundation itself has been working on an intelligent opening up of the site and has taken the first step with the Yard garden: vegetable garden planters for Amsterdammers who don't have a garden themselves. To do this, the Foundation works with partners such as De Onkruidenier. This way, people can safely grow their own vegetables and herbs on site, provided with a specially designed grid that secures the one and a half meter measures. More actions may be set up in the future.

Multidisciplinary artist William de Haan approaches serious issues in a cartoonish, sculptural and sometimes laughable way in order to pay tribute to a certain object, subject or situation. With the site-specific installation 'Landingstrip', he paid tribute to the exceptional spatial environment of the monumental NDSM shipyard and created an alienating situation, blurring the boundaries between script and reality.

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The absurdist presentation North Airport addressed the question of what the multi-deployable space, which originally served as the international infrastructure, could be used in the future. The installation Landing Strip on the Y-slope was part of the overarching project North Airport and was an extension of the fictional Departure Lounge, which Willem de Haan and Kamagurka opened at the Patty Morgan gallery.

Toothbrush, earphones, clean socks, passport? Check! The alarm for the first train to the airport was set, but then... FLIGHT CANCELLED. So back home.

Around the installation Landing Strip a final performance took place on Wednesday, August 14: in CANCELLED | A Performance by Willem de Haan Willem showed that no matter how hard he tried, some things were beyond his control. Because when did you have no choice but to surrender to fate? And what did that fate entail?

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The installation Landing Strip and the project North Airport following the North-South Line, offered a new fictional connection between Amsterdam-North with the city across the street and the rest of the world.

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This project was (partly) made possible by the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts.

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See also: High-rise Camping Nature City (2023) by Willem de Haan at NDSM.

Until October 20, 2019, the work was Happiness of Studio Dries Verhoeven on display at the NDSM shipyard. The work approaches the area where man and artificiality coincide, where artificial means help us to be human again or more, or just leave that being human for a while. In Happiness Dries explores the world of artificial happiness in the form of drugs, painkillers and antidepressants. There is a small pharmacy building on the street. A humanoid — a human-looking robot — works there as a pharmacy assistant. She tells us about the means by which we can regulate the serotonin and dopamine levels in our brain, and thus adjust our reality and perception. Are we moving towards a world where we are lyrical by appointment, programmable in our feelings?

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Now that recreational drug use in the nightlife seems to be becoming mainstream, and the stigma on antidepressants is beginning to disappear, our idea of what emotions are is shifting. We no longer see them as authentic true experiences, but as chemical processes in our brain that we can influence to our heart's content. By controlling the amount of serotonin and dopamine, we are able to create our reality and perception. Politically and socially, there is quite a bit of suspicion about the pharmaceuticals of the influence of consciousness, but how sustainable is this restrained use of the artificial in light of technological developments and growing demand?

To finish, the artist talk “Happiness on Demand” was organized at Sociëteit Sexyland on October 20, 2019, at ADE Hangover. Dries Verhoeven spoke to Machteld Busz (initiator of Poppi: Drugs Museum Amsterdam) and journalist Thijs Roes (De Correspondent and Vice Media) who studied the drug policy of the future. The talk was interpreted by author Marian Donner with appropriate passages from her Self-Devastation Book, that is inspired by 'Happiness'. For the occasion, there was a special artwork by Poppi Drug Museum Amsterdam to admire.

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Happiness was a co-production with the NDSM-werf Foundation & SPRING Performing Arts Festival.

Step Right Up was a project by the Street Theatre Institute Netherlands (SIN), which was located at the NDSM shipyard. Famous theater maker and winner of the 2018 NDSM Open Call, Pieter Post, coached the talents in the run-up to their performances. On 3, 4, 18 & 19 May, 10 & 11 July and 28 & 29 September 2019, the NDSM shipyard provided space for new street theater artists from home and abroad. Performances were held at the location between 13:00 and 18:00. These were free of charge and suitable for all ages. There was also a terrace where food and drinks were available to enjoy during the performance.

Street Theatre Institute Netherlands and Step Right Up

In contrast to neighboring countries, street theater only played a small part in cultural awareness in the Netherlands. On the other hand, it offered a great school for young talents. By playing on the street, they were able to experiment, interact directly with the audience and thus be trained in creating engagement. Both timing and improvisation were very important!

To introduce young makers to the street theater school, the SIN offered by means of Step Right Up a coaching program and stage for this form of play of action and reaction, challenge and response. The talents rehearsed at the SIN theater under the direction of theater maker and director Pieter Post. The SIN was a playground and meeting place for all genres, types and sizes of international theater makers.

The artists

The first weekend was dedicated to Troubamour (Marrit Bausch and Ursel Braaksma) with the show Groundless. Groundless was a physical street theater performance about borders, limitlessness and the urge to limit. About adapting to others and thus sometimes losing a part of yourself. The central question was: what was left of yourself, of a group, or even of a country, when the borders were blurred?

The second weekend was for Milan Seegers, with the show Cuckoo. Cuckoo was an imaginative circus show that celebrated the differences that gave color to our world. Milan was a crazy and absurd figure who enjoyed showing off art with his eggs. This resulted in an acrobatic choreography about picking yourself up, dusting yourself and, above all, never giving up!

The third weekend was the stage for Julia Campistany, with a show about the fragility of harmony: It happens. Through comedy and movement, a dialogue was created between success and failure, beauty and shame, and serenity and unrest. Just when you thought everything was good, you were worried about what might go wrong.

Before the last weekend, during the NDSM Open on Saturday, September 28, 2019, a surprise performance was scheduled!

Visual artist Navid Nuur is fascinated by how human perception works. His works are therefore an interplay between material, architecture and sensory phenomena. Light and darkness have been a recurring element in this for years. For Navid Nuur, light is anything but unambiguous.

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In his series THE AFTER GLOW Navid considered its limitless possibilities. THE AFTER GLOW III here was his latest work of art, specially made for the NDSM shipyard. The art project was shown at three fixed locations, where it blended with the architecture of the old shipyard.

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A fourth element of the project was a newspaper, entitled THE AFTER GLOW, issue 3. This could be found scattered around the shipyard at various points.

About Navid Nuur

Navid Nuur (Tehran, 1976) lives and works in The Hague. Major international solo exhibitions have been shown at Trafó House of Contemporary Arts in Budapest, Marta Herford in Herford, Bonnefantenmuseum in Maastricht, Parasol Unit in London, S.M.A.K in Ghent, Kunsthalle Fridericianum in Kassel and De Hallen in Haarlem. In 2019, a solo exhibition of new work will follow at the Gemeentemuseum The Hague.

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Ferrotopia was an art installation in public spaces, a Gesamtkunstwerk A pop-up museum in one. The art installation was an ode to iron (ferrous = iron) and consisted of a collection of characterful buildings, grouped around a central square. During the previous three years, parts of this had already been shown at the Ruhr Triennial in Bochum (Germany) and at the Center Pompidou in Paris (France). A new work was added to this at the NDSM shipyard: the Valhammer House, a place for destruction and recycling. The ensemble was completed with the unique Happy Watering Shed, a fully equipped and ready-to-use metal workshop, forge and foundry.

Cross-over programming

Against the backdrop of Ferrotopia From the opening, a program of visual arts, design, theater, film, music and lectures has unfolded. This linked the romance of industrial heritage to the rediscovery of new industry and crafts in a circular economy. This program was created in collaboration with, among others, Over het IJ Festival, Partizan Publik, MU Eindhoven, EYE Filmmuseum and, of course, Atelier Van Lieshout itself.

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The focal point of the installation was the Domesticator, who had caused a stir internationally because of her sexual appearance. Atelier Van Lieshout explained the theme of this artwork as follows:

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“Domestikator reflects on the way humans cultivate and domesticate the world by applying their ingenuity and creativity, yet how at the same time they challenge ethical and real borders by new technologies. With the artwork, artist Joep van Lieshout wants to start a dialogue about these positive and negative forces, while playfully addressing one of the last few remaining hypocritical taboos.”

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Ferrotopia was commissioned by the NDSM-werf Foundation. The project was made possible in part by financial contributions from the Municipality of Amsterdam, the Mondriaan Fund, the Amsterdam-Noord district, the Doen Foundation, the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts and Fund 21, and with the cooperation of BeamSystems and Pllek.

Monolith was an object similar to the monolith in Kubrick's film. 2001: A Space Odyssey. The big difference was that here, water flowed from bottom to top over the rectangular shape and clatter down at the back. All works by Feigl were driven by a certain technique, which may not even have always been that complicated, but it created an impressive and grand image every time. This work symbolized the mysterious and inexplicable in our world. The origin and power of the object in the film remained unfathomable, and so in the real world, it was still just as impossible to get a grip on everything in the real world.

2001: A Space Odyssey

At the start of Stanley Kubrick's iconic movie 2001: A Space Odyssey a group of apes in their prehistoric, desert-like environment was suddenly overwhelmed by a strange new presence. A huge black rectangular monolith appeared in their midst and thus provided a strong visual contrast. With some suspicion, the monkeys touched this strange object, which was completely unclear where it had come from. The monolith could be interpreted in various ways, but at least it had to be seen as a catalyst for the development of human evolution. The object set in motion a certain intelligence that led to progress, a need that was peculiar to humans even outside the fictional world of film, who always strived to improve through ever-increasing technological and digital tools.

About Zoro Feigl

Zoro Feigl (Amsterdam, 1983) made work that moved. Feigl was fascinated by why things worked the way they did and why things moved the way they did. Much of his work was designed for exhibition in large spaces and could thus be experienced as fascinating as well as intimidating or even threatening. The sculptures moved according to their own, sometimes predictable and sometimes surprising rhythm. That was the trick for Zoro: understanding the material and the movement and being able to orchestrate them.

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Feigl's work has been shown at Rijksmuseum Twenthe, Stedelijk Museum Schiedam and Museum Voorlinden, as well as at the Verbeke Foundation (Belgium) and exhibitions in China, Japan, Brazil, Russia, Italy and Bulgaria, among others. In 2017, King Willem-Alexander created the artwork ECHO “on” at the opening of the renovated State Office Building in The Hague, which housed, among others, the ministries of Foreign Affairs and Infrastructure and Water Management.

With its expanse, industrial buildings and rugged atmosphere, the NDSM shipyard is a remarkable part of the city. Commissioned by Stichting NDSM- werf, visual artist Jaap Scheeren wandered around the site for a few months and captured the unpolished character in a collection of life-size landscape portraits. In his work, he searches for the hidden stories beneath the turbulent surface of the NDSM. The photo series is therefore an ode to the shipyard as a place for the imagination.

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The images were later featured in the NDSM special edition of Mr. Motley Magazine.