Opening Soon: A Brand New Installation by Levi van Veluw at Het HEM
We are thrilled to announce that later this month a new semi-permanent installation by Levi van Veluw will be revealed at Het HEM.
Situated in a former munitions factory, Het HEM is a new home for contemporary culture. Together with today’s visionaries, we develop multidisciplinary art programmes that shed new light on the world around us. Central to this is a playful and open approach in both creating and experiencing art.
At the Hembrug site in Zaandam, behind high fences and strict security, the Artillery Establishments from 1895 produced firearms, artillery and ammunition for the Dutch army. In 2003 the site’s military functions were suspended and the first artists and creatives came to settle. A decade later, a few entrepreneurs followed after the government’s go-ahead to redevelop the site into a residential and recreational area.
Since 2017, Amerborgh International has been the owner of the former munitions factory on this site, a two-hundred-metre-long white building from 1956 on the banks of the North Sea Canal. In 2018, Het HEM BV was founded as a subsidiary of Amerborgh to give the munitions factory new purpose as a meeting place for contemporary culture. Het HEM Foundation was established that same year as the cultural conscience of Het HEM. The Foundation produces an artistic programme that keeps a close eye on developments across the Hembrug site and connects with social movements at a local, national and international level.
The controversial history and origin of the industrial area provides a contrasting framework for questioning the role of people and society. The expansion of the city of Amsterdam to Zaandam and the gentrification process that this entails also give direction to our programme.
ABOUT Levi van Veluw
Levi van Veluw was born in the city of Hoevelaken in 1985. He lives and works near Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Over the past 15 years, Van Veluw has produced a diverse and evolving oeuvre that is exhibited all around the world. He is known for installations, sculptures, drawings, and autobiographical films that draw from his childhood memories. From the depths of his memory, the artist unearths images that provoke universal emotions and question our human logic. Van Veluw plays with elements of order and chaos, posing to the viewer questions about our obsessive pursuit of control.
Van Veluw creates his works with extreme care and craftsmanship; his sculptures of clay and wood are made entirely by hand, giving them an authentic, coarse, and organic character. His intricately built-up charcoal drawings show great symmetry and harmony, whilst his remarkable use of light evokes a strong, meditative mood. The installations by Van Veluw offer intense and immersive experiences. In the past, he has built complete, though fictional cathedrals – amongst other dark and sensory spaces built of obscure forms and materials. Visitors that enter Van Veluw’s alternate realities become disassociated from their existing spatial interpretations. They experience a disruptive environment where both order and chaos live one amongst the other.
The work of Van Veluw has been exhibited internationally in leading museums and institutions worldwide, such as the Museum of Arts and Design, New York; the Bass Museum of Art, Miami; Ars Electronica, Linz; Centro Nacional de las Artes, Mexico City; Design Museum, London; Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, and Marres House for Contemporary Culture, Maastricht, amongst others. His work is included in both public and private collections, such as the Borusan Collection, Istanbul; Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar; Museum MORE, Gorssel; the KPMG Art Collection, Amstelveen; the Ekard Collection, Wassenaar; the Lakeside Collection, Rotterdam, and Cobra to Contemporary/The Brown Family Collection.
Additionally, Van Veluw has worked on commissions for private clients. Within these commissions he has undertaken many collaborations. In 2012, Van Veluw worked alongside curator Marc Coetzee on the film “Family”, produced as part of the “Films4peace” project. In 2014, working alongside Hermès, Van Veluw created a life-sized site-specific installation for one of their main windows in Shanghai. Van Veluw has also participated in international film festivals, including Addis Foto Fest, Addis Ababa; Afrika Film festival, Leuven; Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival, Port of Spain, and West Midlands Human Rights Film Festival, Birmingham.
