Category Archives: Works

Mnemonics

a project in collaboration with Susana Mendes Silva

Hangar, center for artistic research
Rua Damasceno Monteiro, Lisbon (P)
June 28, 2019
 

The project Mnemonics started with a suggestion of curator Filipa Oliveira to the artists to meet each other, since their activities and points of view seemed to have many overlaps. After a first meeting, they decided to work together
and the collaboration started with an exercise:

Two car journeys on two consecutive days. The two events had to be as much alike as possible. They had to take place at the same time, on the same route and with the same conversations as accurately as possible.

This exercise led them to the subject of the construction and deconstruction of personal memory. How can memories lead to a journey and how can a journey lead to memories?
The human mind as a fluidly changing field of encounters.

The performative presentation of the project took place at Hangar on June 28, 2019


photo © Mnemonics

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Palimpsest

(with Elia Torrecilla)
Centro del Carme Cultura Contemporania, Valencia (E)
May 25, 2019

The Centre del Carme consists of two architectural constructions from very different eras. It concerns a Gothic passage and garden and a Renaissance passage and garden, connected by a single transfer room. In this performance, Elia Torrecilla and Frans van Lent looked for the numerical relationship between themselves as moving individuals and the architectural construction.
Within the passage in the Gothic part, the walk was guided by a series of loudly spoken numbers with the fixed proportions of the Golden Ratio. It was set up by a predefined formula and realized according to its logical consequences.
Within the Renaissance monastery the walk was improvised on the basis of simple geometric compositions, with the architectural structure as the leading framework. In this part the audience was asked to participate, resulting in a spacial cacophony of loudly spoken numbers.

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Hortus Botanicus

the feet are tied to the ground, thoughts travel freely

On Tuesday, May 21 2019, from 12:00 noon to 12:15 PM, I stood motionless and silent
in a field in the Jardim Botânico (N 38° 43′ 4.8” W 9° 8′ 52.9”) in Lisbon.
I faced North, my eyes closed.

At the same time Daniel Pinheiro stood motionless and silent
in a field in the Jardim Botânico (N 41° 9′ 6.905″ W 8° 38′ 36.193″) in Porto,
facing South, his eyes closed.

Rest in peace dear Daniel.

Het Binnenhuis

…ism project space, The Hague (NL)
March 14/15, 2019
19:00-23:00 h.

Het Binnenhuis (The Interior) is a transition zone between the public and the private,
a territory in which some spaces are closed and others are temporarily opened. 

In the performative installation Het Binnenhuis the spatial structure of a house is inhabited for two nights by 16 performers. The performers are not aiming at a theatrical spectacle but they are staying in an atmosphere of domestic reality, according to common rules for specific rooms. Their movements are by and large predefined, and worked out in improvisations.

During the two nights everybody was welcome. The visitors were asked not to behave as an audience, but as guests in a private home. They were part of the work and as such free to stay, within the limitations of the social context.
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A Dinner with Guillaume

23 November, 2018
Morni Hills Performance Art Biennale II
Healing Hill Art Space
Morni Hills (Badisher), Haryana, India.

I was invited to create a work for the curatorial program When Words Become Situations
In the framework of the Morni Hills Performance Art Biennale II. 
I invited the responsible curator Guillaume Dufour Morin to join me for dinner.
I asked him to choose the menu and then I prepared the same dishes.

photos © Frans van Lent & B Ajay Sharma

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Record

In my hands I hold two camcorders.
I set both cameras to record. I hand one camera to a person (A). I ask him to film me, while following me.
I walk to a second person (B), hand him the second camera and again ask him to film me, while following me.
I turn to person A, ask the camera back and then hand it to another person (C) while giving her the same instruction. I walk to person B, ask back the camera and hand it to another person (D) while giving him the same instruction.
This process of swapping, walking and filming goes on for about 15 minutes.
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Two Walks in the Same Direction

On Wednesday, August 22, 2018, at 2 pm (CEST), Elia Torrecilla and Frans van Lent started walking in north-westerly direction. Elia Torrecilla walked in the area of Altea, Spain (38°36’19.7″N 0°02’28.3″W) and Frans van Lent walked in the area of the Biesbosch, the Netherlands (51°48’34.8″N 4°46’38.0″E). Alternately they sent each other photos of their locations and by doing so they turned these two separate walks into one shared experience.

The walks lasted about 1 hour and 24 photos were sent.
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A Scene #14: Over and Under

On Saturday December 15, 2018 at 14:20 CET I waited for a tram in southern direction, at tram stop Leuvehaven (51°54’55.625″N, 4°28’56.857″E), Rotterdam. I stepped into the first arriving tram. The tram crossed the river Maas over the Erasmus bridge. I got off the tram at the first stop on the other side of the river: Wilhelminaplein (51°54’26.72″N, 4°29’34.756″E).
I then entered the Metro station and waited at the platform for a metro train in Northern direction. I took the first arriving train, and crossed the river Maas through the tunnel. I left the train at the first stop: Leuvehaven.

About Scenes:
On this website and on Facebook I announce small events that will take place at a certain location and at a certain moment in the near future.
Everybody is invited to be at the exact spot at the exact time to contribute to the scene with his/her own simultaneous activity (or inactivity).