PROJECTS
CONCEPT / CREATION / RESEARCH
A selection of my work; Story maps, performance art, narrated long-distance hikes, toolkits, videos, situated interventions and more.
(Un)disciplined and uncommitted to specific media, my main priority is to make visible the initially-invisible. I do this by opportunistic employment of artistic tools and strategies that interrupt our everyday lived experiences and make us ask 'why' we do things the way we do them. My work seeks to unsettle assumptions of who 'we' are, and how 'we' relate to 'ourselves', 'others' and the world. My topics include gender, conservation, media, discourse, the urban, queerness but transgress disciplines and boundaries.
GALLERY
Showcase
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MX. SCIENCE
Situated performance(s)
As a PhD candidate that explores ways to engage differentiated knowledges within Canadian Arctic research, and polar bear monitoring research specifically, I am interested in practices that move beyond 'integration/inclusion' approaches. As such I theorize PRACTICE according to the framework of "ethical space" (Ermine, 2007). For such practice to take place we need a "third" space - outside of each knowledge system.
To create such a space, where multiple knowledge systems can meaningfully negotiate their mutual terms of engagement, western systems need to "roll back/decolonize/question their positionality" first. My persona (beyond bringing playfulness and hopefully a smile to your face) invites especially non-indigenous researchers to rethink and reflect on their role and position in our scientific landscape. As a figure that potentially unsettles several norms within the Arctic sciences, Mx. Science holds potential to invoke conversations, and create a liminal space to build new relationships. As a situated performance it is both an exercise in new ways of engaging each other through genuine curiosity, as well as an effective tool to que(e)ry where and when differentiated bodies dis/connect in space.
VOICES OF THUNDER
PHD RESEARCH CREATION
Polar bear management policies in the last two decades, including a polar bear hunting moratorium, have disproportionately impacted Gjoa Haven compared to other Nunavut communities. Gjoa Haven hunters seek recognition of the impacts of these quotas on income, culture, and inter-generational knowledge transfer. They also seek better integration of their knowledge in polar bear monitoring and management. Engaging with Gjoa Haven’s appeal for wider recognition of these impacts, the community and I have co-produced several knowledge products, targeting multiple audiences, within the BearWatch monitoring project.
‘We seek acknowledgement and apologies for suffering the consequences of the quota regulations; a loss of culture and knowledge, as well as increased danger due to rising number of polar bears around their communities. Inuit knowledge in terms of accuracy and inherent value needs to be recognized and better acknowledged. We want better integration of Inuit knowledge in survey research, like for example accounting for seasonal changes. Scientific monitoring surveys have limitations, we ask that researchers will recognize and take Inuit observations more seriously.
VOICES OF THUNDER: ANIMATED GRAPHIC
Testimonies from hunters and elders about polar bear quota reduction impacts in Gjoa Haven.
Art by Danny Aaluk
VOICES OF THUNDER: TIMELINE
Testimonies from hunters and elders about polar bear quota reduction impacts.
WINDS OF CHANGE
Gjoa Haven is seeking recognition; ‘We want these ‘‘voices of thunder to echo everywhere’’.
These stories should finally come out. There are two generations lost and ‘’millions of dollars’’ in sportshunting. We want everyone to hear us. ‘’We’re tired of waiting’’.
VOICES OF THUNDER; A TESTIMONIAL READING
This academic paper, targeting academics and other scientists active in Nunavut invites fellow scholars and colleagues to join in a testimonial reading of the quota reduction impacts as testified to by Gjoa Haven’s community members.
DRAGKING ACADEMY AMSTERDAM
As a founding member of the House of Lostbois collective, me and my dragking 'brothers' diversify queer spaces and stages. As Vinny von Vinci, a boylesque/drag performer, I celebrate and politicize (my) queer body and genders and explore the potential of the stage for queer ways of knowing and being.
The gallery below links to my instagram account, recording this ongoing manifestation of gender performativity and queer kinship
DWARS DOOR HET OOSTEN
Long-term multimedia storymapping / journalism project on the opportunities and innovation that takes place in rural areas of the Netherlands.
For this ongoing project, I cross the country by foot, arranging interviews and encounters on the go. I share dinners with strangers and stay at their homes, while we exchange stories and experiences of our country, before continuing my walk the next day.
Due to the highly localized and specific cultural nuances of this project, the storymaps are in Dutch. It's visual set-up, however, still makes it worth-while exploring, regardless of the languages you speak.
EXPLORING JOURNALISM'S LIMITS
In 2018-2019, I worked as an embedded researcher for 'Exploring Journalism's limits' - A practice-based research collaboration between the RUG (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen), HU (Hogeschool Utrecht) and Verspers.
during this period I co-authord two articles and developed an online toolkit for freshly graduated journalists.
TOWARDS AN EXPERIENTIALIST UNDERSTANDING OF
JOURNALISM: EXPLORING ARTS-BASED RESEARCH FOR
JOURNALISM STUDIES
Published may 2020 in Journalism Studies
In this paper, we explore the ways in which we can employ arts-based
research methods to unpack and represent the diversity and
complexity of journalistic experiences and (self) conceptualisations.
We address the need to reconsider the ways in which we theorise
and research the field of journalism. We thereby aim to
complement the current methodologies, theories, and prisms
through which we consider our object of study to depict more
comprehensively the diversity of practices in the field. To gather
stories about journalism creatively (and ultimately more inclusively
and richly), we propose and present the use of arts-based research
methods in journalism studies. By employing visual and narrative
artistic forms as a research tool, we make room for the senses,
emotion and imagination on the part of the respondents,
researchers and audiences of the output. We draw on a specific
collaboration with artists and journalists that resulted in a research
event in which 32 journalists were invited to collaboratively
recreate the “richness and complexity” of journalistic practices.
AFRISPECTIVES
Storymapping & Educational toolkit
In 2016 I conceptualized and co-developed the Afrispectives platform. Although the project is ongoing, I transferred my involvement with the project to the community partners that participated in setting it up.
Afrispectives is a Dutch based non-profit platform by and for people of African and Afro-Caribbean descent. Through this online space people from all over the world can find each other and exchange stories, creativity, businesses and knowledge. We aim to connect our people so we can find and support each other in the Netherlands and abroad. By connecting, embracing and celebrating our heritage, we aim to redefine our history, present and future from a Pan-African and decolonial perspective.
These stories also form a reference point for an educational toolkit that was developed by me, IDleaks and Aspha Bijnaar, which was made available for free to educational professionals in the Netherlands. This project is financed through the Dutch ministry of Social Affairs in the context of the Dutch implementation of the UN decade of people of African Descent. The project facilitators are IDleaks, Mano a Mano Producoes and studio Gingertheworld.
THE MICROBAR
The microbar is an intervention / foodtruck. We toured Dutch food- and Music festivals from 2014-2016 to spread awareness around the carbon footprint of eating meat. We took a culinary approach towards the UN recommendation of adding insect to our Western diets and served delicious snacks made with grasshoppers and mealworms
ARTSTIKKE ART-DEPT.
I Co-Founded and Managed Artstikke Art Department for over a decade.
We were responsible for the Art-direction of projects by Microsoft, Amnesty International, Oxfam, Adidas and many more.
Artstikke is an Amsterdam based company, specialized in communicating a specific story through the Art-direction of multi-media productions, including commercials and feature films as well as events and campaigns. Apart from more hands-on skills like creative design, conceptualising, set-design, special prop making and carpentry, my experience while running Artstikke included team leadership, budgeting and project management.