In a fully green room, a serieus question is asked.

(From the museum's description)

Harrison Pearce explores the relationship between tech-nology, humanity and creativity. His kinetic sculptures form a network with its own rules, where information appears to be exchanged. According to Constant's thinking people should have more opportunity to be playful and inventive now that work is becoming more and more automated. Today's reality is more complex: our creativity is often facilitated by large tech companies that thereby increase their own power.

Pearce finds this contradiction interesting. The devices in this room are based on a scan of his own brain.

Do machines know more than you do about who you are? In this installation, human intelligence and machine become one big hybrid organism. The musical score, featuring the classical viola da gamba, is by Liam Byrne.

And towards the end of the exhibit, I was moved to see a work by Sadik Kwaish Alfraij.

(From the museum's description)

Sadik Kwaish Alfraji tells stories about movement, exile and language. His work often originates in a personal memory of Iraq, where he was born. Using charcoal and ink, he incorporates his dreams and memories into a clear, monumental image. Alfraji is intrigued by the way language shapes us. Alphabet Tree refers to the books children use to learn to read and write. The drawings of trees clarify the relationship between symbols and sounds.

Trees are also important symbols in many belief systems, where they represent the cycle of life. In Assyrian reliefs -an important source of inspiration for Alfraji a date palm would be depicted as the tree of life. The Assyrian Empire, like Babylon, was situated in Mesopotamia, which we know today as Iraq. This region is regarded as the birthplace of our knowledge of the universe.

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Some amazing works, like

Frank Ammerlaan's abstract paintings bringing together the terrestrial and the cosmic. Some fabrics are imbued with terrestrial matter, while others contain cosmic particles. Exposed to rain, dust and earth, the fabrics show visible marks of time. The cosmic particles stem from the earliest days of the solar system. Scientists regard the cosmos as the vital source for life on earth

Untitled (Hemicycle) was inspired by the hemicycle, a semi-circular shape used in the design of many parliament bulidings. It is intended to encourage consensus rather than confruntation between political parties

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This following artwork was not completely new to me, because I had seen it before two years ago at the Textile Biennial Rijswijk in 2023, but again it made me stop and look at it in detail.

Very impressive, yet again!

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Constant and his views of the future, a New Babylon.

New Babylon is an anti-capitalist city perceived and designed in 1959-74 as a future potentiality by visual artist Constant Nieuwenhuys.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Babylon_(Constant_Nieuwenhuys)

... if only the Kunstmuseum would dedicate the entire museum to his work!

j/k

a bit

really

sigh

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In the next posts I'll add more photos of the exhibition New New Babylon in the Kunstmuseum Den Haag, but I want to start with a photo of the entrance hall.

This museum was built to educate and show people what a museum is/can be.

The new museum must therefore avoid any impression of elitism; it should be a cultural temple for the common man. It was also to be a modern museum, complete with the latest gadgets and presentation techniques.

https://www.kunstmuseum.nl/en/museum/about-us/museum-building

When your visit this museum, check out the measurements: everything is measured in 11, or 1.1, or 55, or 3.3, etc etc etc.

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Goeiemorgen / Good morning!

Early start because painters have started work on our section of the house "hof" in the street.

Half a day at work, and this afternoon I will visit the Kunstmuseum/Gemeentemuseum here in The Hague, specifically to see the exhibit New New Babylon

https://www.kunstmuseum.nl/en/exhibitions/new-new-babylon

Constant's New Babylon gave me chills when I saw his work at this museum many years ago, and I am curious to see how other artists have interpreted his view on our future.

(From the Constant New Babylon exhibit, 2016)

https://photos.vitaulium.eu/share/bl_0BxWNtGy8SYhxnZDH3_5i75s0DcdpIiqkkq2OTNEznVPJ_jje8wxpyVeq3O4xga0

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New New Babylon

Step into New New Babylon at Kunstmuseum Den Haag, where artists and thinkers reimagine the future. Discover bold visions of creativity, freedom, and change!

Kunstmuseum Den Haag