This year PeriFeria is situated at Marais/Moeras, a small park situated at the farm and studio of painter Felix De Boeck (1898 – 1995). With this important representative of the arts in the Brussels Fringe in mind, we are transforming the beautiful orchard on the grounds of Felix De Boeck into an ephemeral open-air art gallery. Painter Jan Verbruggen, photographer Barbara Sandra and artist Paoletta Holst show work that is indebted to the layered periphery of Brussels.
Barbara Sandra is entangled with the border, but also with the possibility of imagining and shaping it differently, in her photography practice as well as urban planner. We come across borders when we are ‘on the road’. For the project Walk The Line – The Brussels Border, she walked along the border around the Brussels-Capital Region with her camera; along the Channel, the ecological corridors (Vogelzangbeek, Kattebroek, …), across the provincial roads, through the woods, around private domains, …
Jan Verbruggen makes paintings, drawings and installations. In his paintings he creates imaginary landscapes, in this way he explores the boundaries of the area that surrounds him and (dis)orientation plays an important role. In a similar way as a map is indispensable when travelling, but at times also difficult to read. You are being challenged to navigate through the landscapes that Verbruggen presents.
Paoletta Holst works as an artist, architectural researcher and writer. Her practice investigates the effect of spatial/political power structures on our living environment and the strategies people devise to deal with them. She is currently working on Colonial Traces, an artistic research project on colonial architecture in Indonesia. For PeriFeria she developed a lecture performance in which she reactivates the Zenne Atlas, a work she created in 2015, and will talk about the river as a fringe and backside of the city and society, a place of seduction and aversion.
