The main theme of the 2020 Paper Biennial is the topical subject Home. In our globalised world it has become uncommon to stay at the same place as where one was born. More than ever, and for many different reasons, people emigrate. But everyone has in common that they long for a save Home. Home is a universal understanding with many meanings and interpretations. For everyone it is essential to call a place Home; absence of a home is disruptive and will blow away the ground under every existence. Recent figures speak of 68 million refugees in the world and 5 million stateless people; they are not recognized by their government and do not have a passport. A part of the economical immigrants is exploited as modern slaves and does not have the opportunity to build a new and save existence.
Migration is an important political topic you can daily read about it in the newspapers. People are afraid that the large amount of immigrants will influence their culture in a way that their identity will vanish and that they will lose their acquired liberties. The indigenous people are literally and figuratively building walls at their borders, while immigrants are seeking for a save home for their family, for a better place to raise their children.
When we established HOME as the theme for the Paper Biennial 2020, we could not know that it would become such an important item so soon. It was already topical, but the international lockdown that made us work at home, teach at home, entertain ourselves at home and gave it a whole new dimension that has never been more discussed than now. HOME is a topic that everyone in the world is now occupied with, not just the homeless, the fugitives and the stateless. More than ever, everyone now needs a safe home.
The Paper Biennial 2020 shows the many interpretations and meanings of the term HOME that artists give to it in their work. They are personal views that deal with domestic circumstances that can be easily felt by everyone. The artists participating in the exhibition are socially committed and/or provide insight into their work as a world citizen. The sum of the visions on the HOME theme are testimonies of the universality that everyone clings to love and security.
The work I created for this exhibition is Zachte Landing.
Participating Aritsts:
Quentley Barbara Lebohang Kganye
Anna van Bohemen Marianne Lammersen
Ulli Böhmelmann Miriam Londoño
Ronny Delrue Toos Nijssen
Darja Eßer Mardoe Painter
Rosa Everts Pim Palsgraaf
pietsjanke fokkema Marisa Rappard
Gianfranco Gentile Stéphanie Saadé
Lenneke van der Goot Josephine Tabbert
Susanna Inglada Minna Tammi
Marieke de Jong Senol Tatli