Dolf Henkes Prijs 2010

The Dolf Henkes Award is one of the larger prizes for visual art in the Netherlands, and has been awarded every two years to a prominent Rotterdam-based artist since 2004. An indepent jury shortlists four artists who fit the profile, inspired by the artist and city chronicler from whom the award derives its name, Dolf Henkes (1903-1989): resolute and exemplary for the artistic climate in Rotterdam. Previous winners of the award were Jeroen Eisinga, Erik van Lieshout and Melvin Moti. This year for the first time the awarding of the prize was accompanied by an exhibition of the nominees.

The monumental drawings of Aji V.N. (Kerala, 1968) are full of atmosphere, soberly composed of soft colours. Travelling between India and Rotterdam, he develops his handwriting in water colour and charcoal on coloured paper. His themes range from human figures to woods, deserts, seas and air. Some drawings display a strong chiaroscuro, others focus on lines and contours.

At the centre of the art practice of Lara Almarcegui (Zaragoza, 1972) is her fascination with spaces that escape the design of architects and urban planners, like wastelands, demolition areas and allotment gardens. She often produces guides to the wasteland she wants to show, with texts and photographs telling the story of the location. A collection of unplanned space across the globe has emerged that way, with guides and slide shows of places like Sao Paulo, Dubai, Amsterdam and London.

Otto Egbert’s slightly surreal drawings, paintings and installations of Otto Egberts (Vlaardingen, 1949-Rotterdam, 2019) give shape to continuous and progressive doubts about human existence. He developed a consistent body of work in which the human condition and man’s relationship with his surroundings take centre stage. To Egberts, the meaning of space in a social as well as an existential sense is not only a personal, but a philo-sophical question.

Jasper Niens (Zwolle, 1980) makes architectonic installations, both in public spaces and in institutional contexts. Installations with numerous doors, blocks barricading the way: these may be acceptable constructions in an exhibition, but does the same go for our over-regulated public space? Niens’ work directly confronts the viewer and challenges unspoken conventions regarding the use of public and semi-public space.