White Gold

About this activity.

Joppe Venema, Margriet van Weenen and Jun Zhang

Curator: Lieneke Hulshof

Since time immemorial, people have been digging into the earth's surface in the hope of finding raw materials. There we extract, mine and harvest oil, gas, water, coal, gold and potatoes.

The soil of the three provinces surrounding CAMPIS played an indispensable role in feeding, protecting and heating Dutch households. Gas was found in Groningen, Drenthe was rich in peat and Overijssel gave us salt.

In recent centuries, we extracted these raw materials voraciously and these resources made a contribution to Dutch prosperity that should not be underestimated. But now it appears that we have to pay a price for that. Something was taken from the soil, but nothing was returned. Not to the earth itself and not to the people who inhabit this land.

Artists Joppe Venema, Margriet van Weenen and Jun Zhang participate in the exhibition White Gold. The soil and raw materials of Groningen, Overijssel and Drenthe formed the starting point for their works of art. The three artists look at the specific forces of gas, peat and salt and use them as ingredients for new stories about invisible energy flows, melting glaciers and a fertility cave.

Venema, Van Weenen and Zhang show that the substances we dig up carry meaning. They look beyond our urge to consume and grope for an equal relationship with the world that lies a few meters beneath our feet.

CAMPIS.

Location.

Kunstpodium CAMPIS
Kerkstraat 31
9401 GV Assen
www.campis.nl/