SoAP

The work of Johannes Bellinkx (1978) operates on the fringes of theatre, visual arts and film. His practice centres on finding fresh and unexpected strategies to express the interaction between form and content.

Since 2017, Bellinkx has cultivated a reputation as a practitioner, both in the Netherlands and internationally. Reverse has frequently featured on the programme of numerous several European performing arts festivals in recent years. In view of the interdisciplinary nature of his work, Bellinkx is also working to establish himself in the visual arts circuit.

In the coming period his aim is to develop and refine his creative language, creating bolder, sharper, more radical work without sacrificing nuance and subtlety, preferably in new collaborations and with practitioners from other disciplines.

Bellinkx is currently (22/23) working with visual artist Daan Brinkmann on the Parcel Project, an immersive project about the journey a postal package takes.

“Hello, let me introduce myself, I am a postal parcel! I consist of cellulose and lignin fibers, some sticky tape and a premise to keep your stuff whole. My appearance is like a shell, the inner emptiness allows me to contain things. Whether it be socks or noodles, vibrators or fentanyl: I will enclose myself around practically every consumer good on the planet. 

All this time I was just one click away from you. Until, abracadabra: I stood at your door. To get to you I rolled, slid, bumped and jumped from node to node, through the logistical maze that covers our planet like a candy wrapper. In my travels, I encounter X-ray scanners, sniffing dog noses, or rough treatment if I’m unlucky. Sometimes I have bruises. And when I finally arrive and all the hard work is done: I end up in the paper bin.

But not this time.

See, I’m actually not an average pack. Instead of consumer goods, I contain digital eyes and ears; tools that allow you to feel a space that is normally inaccessible to you. Come and ride along!”

Rita Hoofwijk (1994) is a Dutch artist. Her work begins in actual, Rita Hoofwijk creates installations and does site-specific, spatial interventions. These temporary environments seem to ask us, in all simplicity, to reconsider what is perceived as fixed and unchanging. In varying collaborations she explores the possibilities of the spaces that define her practice.

Lately, Rita has been busy with Jean. Jean is to be visited via the traveler’s smartphone, on the train, for the duration of a journey. It was inspired by a manifesto by artist Jean Tinguely, in which he called for throwing away our watches, putting the minutes and hours beside us.

With Jean, artist Rita Hoofwijk offers a service for a clock-less journey. Not the clockwork, but the perception and experience of constant movement are central: the movement of the train itself; of the body; of fellow travelers boarding and disembarking; the landscape outside, the changing seasons. Jean invites the loss of any sense of time and focuses all the more on the experience of time.

In addition, a preview of the second edition of A series of Suggestions could be found in the foyer of the Brakke Grond during Beyond the Black Box. This publication series is part of Leonie Persyn’s (Ghent University, S:PAM – Studies in Performing Arts and Media) research project The sound of shared Intimacy. Each edition unfolds and celebrates a specific collaboration. In the second edition Here (not anywhere), Leonie Persyn and Rita Hoofwijk look at what happens in the encounter between a place and an artist, an artist and an audience, and an audience and a place. In an unfolding dialogue, they explore what it means to be here in Rita Hoofwijk’s artistic practice.

Salomé Mooij, performer and theater maker, was born in The Hague on December 10, 1990. After high school, she traveled to Belgium to study Philosophy at the University of Ghent and Theater Directing at the RITCS (Brussels). In the coming years, Salomé will focus on developing her artistic practice. In doing so, she will be supported by C-Takt, De Brakke Grond, wpZimmer, De Nwe Vorst and METROPOLIS/KIT.

Salomé makes insitu work at the intersection of performance and artistic research: physical thinking exercises characterized by a desire to explore, unfold and connect the micro and macro levels of our existence. Within these theatrical frameworks she explores the connections that are possible between different realities in the city, with a special focus on that which is hidden from view. By magnifying details, she hopes to make visible a field of forces, in which the audience may examine its own relationship as a participant.

Recently, Salomé worked on Proximics, a performance about proximity. Based on Edward T. Hall’s book, The Hidden Dimension, she practices relating to the other and the space between us through various proximities, distances and approaches. Sometimes this is an awkward exercise, a most clumsy act, is sometimes unintelligible and sometimes too loud, stays too far or comes too close; one thing is clear: in any case, it cannot be done without the other.

Nick Steur (1982) has a specific and highly personal signature: poetic, earthy, visual and intuitive. He uncovers timeless worlds through raw matter and extreme concentration, dictated by natural laws. A way of looking and doing that is at odds with our highly complex and technological world, if not almost forgotten.

Although his work is at the intersection of art and theatre, the performative component is essential: As a performer, Steur’s interaction with the view is intrinsic to his practice, shaping an experience that can only happen here, and only once.

Lately, Nick has been working on TREK, a collaboration with Peergroup. Nick: “I am fascinated by the story and journey of these boulders. After all, there are no soil-borne stones at this site. They were left behind after the penultimate Ice Age, when they came down here from Scandinavia. Actually, they still roam today; the boulders move slowly but in many ways and often by human hands. The project focuses on the boulder and man and stone travel together through the Drenthe landscape they share.”

Together with Dirk Bruinsma, artistic director of Peergroup, he explored the landscape from Peergroup’s base of operations in Donderen and developed the silence walk TREK.

TREK is a completely independent walk. You get a personal code when you book this short pilgrimage for two. With that, you can enter the TREK container during the day, get an audio introduction and leave behind as much baggage as you dare to let go. Then you choose a cord and attach yourself to the stone of your choice (your new weight). Together you follow the plotted route at your own pace, in silence. The whole day is yours.

TAAT is a collective that works on the boundary of theatre, architecture, visual arts and performance. In 2012, Gert-Jan Stam (1972) and Breg Horemans (1985) worked together on the KHOR I project at the Floriade in Venlo (NL). Looking back, this turned out to be the starting point for a long-term collaboration under the name TAAT, Theatre as Architecture, Architecture as Theatre.

On the same day, the HALL33 project saw the light of day. HALL33 is a key project within TAAT’s young body of work, as it questions essential themes at the intersection of theater and architecture. In addition to building a Live Archive in which it aims to house all projects from 2011 to the present, TAAT is collaborating with SoAP and the River Meuse on Maas Lab. Maas Lab was born out of our shared curiosity about how an actual partnership with the Maas – a more-than-human entity – can change our human way of looking at entities and organizations in general.

Anneke’s role – in and for the sector – is a dynamic one. In the multitude of activities, partners and ideas, she constantly focuses on changing work practices and (perhaps new) ways of producing, and lightweight collaborations with new practitioners. She has worked with Edit Kaldor (2011 – 2013), Lotte van den Berg (2013 – 2016) and theatercollectief Schwalbe (2015 – present).

In recent years, Tonen has built up a practice in a variety of collaborations, characterized by a continuous questioning attitude. This increasingly led to new forms of partnerships, different perspectives on ways of organizing, flexibility in thinking within projects and processes and an investigation in the ever-changing relationship between art and society.

Anneke Tonen studied Theatre Sciences at the University of Amsterdam and did a master’s degree in Comparative Cultural Analysis, where she graduated with a thesis on the overvaluation of knowledge in society.

She is managing director of SoAP Maastricht.

Benjamin Vandewalle (1983) attended the Royal Ballet School Antwerp and graduated from P.A.R.T.S. in 2006. After operating primarily ‘in the black box’ for nine years, Vandewalle felt the need to break out of the theatre’s comfort zone. He sought refuge in a research project on urban choreography.

In 2019, Vandewalle toured Europe with, Studio Cité, his ‘artistic fair’: a playground for the human gaze in the form of installations, performances and interventions. Installing Studio Cité on a city square, Vandewalle created a space to host social meetings, discussions and exchange of ideas.

From 2017 to 2021, Vandewalle is artist-in-residence at the Kaaitheater in Brussels.