Mater is a research platform exploring materials through the eyes of artists and researchers. From the 22nd until the 31st March, Mater will be hosting their first physical exhibition at Mediamatic. The Metamorphosis of Matter brings together new and existing collaborators, 6 artists, and 4 new writing commissions with workshops and events.
Mater is a research project that platforms artists and writers who shift perspectives on how we engage with the world of materials. Mater has commissioned four new pieces of writing by Amsterdam-based artists and curators on the occasion of this exhibition at Mediamatic. It will contain works by Rajyashri Goody, Elena Khurtova, Nazif Lopulissa, Vibeke Mascini, Hannah Rowan, Thebe Magugu, and newly commissioned writing by Amanda Pinatih, Musoke Nalwoga, Vibeke Mascini and Rajyashri Goody. Over two events these texts will be read by the authors followed by an audience discussion.
Exhibition on view from March 22nd until March 30th
Reading Material with Vibeke Mascini on March 24th
Opening Drinks on March 24th
Reading Material with Amanda Pinatih & Musoke Nalwoga on March 30th
All events will take place at Mediamatic's Sluisdeurenloods
Reading Material
Mater has commissioned four new pieces of writing by Amsterdam-based artists and curators. Over two events, these texts will be read by their respective authors followed by an audience discussion.
Reading"The World is a Verb"with Vibeke Mascini. March 24th, 14.00-15.00. Special performance at opening day.
Musoke Nalwoga (1994) was born and raised in Uganda. She is currently working in Amsterdam as a curator and researcher with a focus on contemporary art. Musoke studied Art History at University College Roosevelt in Middelburg, did a master's in Cultural Analysis at the University of Amsterdam, and a research masters in Critical studies at Sandberg Institute. Musoke is the founding director of Motormond Amsterdam, a new art gallery that aims to give a much-needed update to the idea of the ‘white cube’.
Thebe Magugu
Thebe Magugu is a young designer based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Originally from the small town of Kimberley, he moved to Johannesburg to study fashion design, fashion photography and fashion media from LISOF. After winning best graduate collection, he interned and worked for a selection of designers fashion institutions and retailers. After 2 years, he began his namesake label, THEBE MAGUGU - a South African fashion brand primarily operating within the field of women’s ready to wear.
Rajyashri Goody (1990) b. Pune, India, lives and works in India and the Netherlands. Goody has a B.A in Sociology from Fergusson College, Pune and an M.A in Visual Anthropology from the University of Manchester, UK. Goody's art practice is informed by her academic background and her Ambedkarite Dalit roots. She is interested in creating space and time for thinking through everyday instances of caste-based violence and Dalit resistance, and how elements like food, nature, language and literacy are actively used as tools to enforce caste rules for generations.
Using fluid media including video, installation, sound and text, Vibeke Mascini explores the sensorial scaling of abstract phenomena, with the intention to seek agency from intimacy. In long-term collaboration with scientists, engineers, government employees, and musicians she proposes the development of a conscious understanding of electric energy as a statement of interconnectedness and entanglement – between species, media and nature, matter and energy. By exploring the complex relationship between source and user, and focusing on the material implications of unlikely sources from which electricity is derived, Mascini proposes installations where memories and mysterious sensorial experiences meet the newest technology of the rapidly growing field of energy storage systems.
Amanda Pinatih (1987) is Design Curator at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. Here she provides the vast design collection with new perspectives. Her experimental working method is characterized by developing other forms of knowledge transfer and explores how historical collections can work participatively and associatively on younger generations. Through exhibitions and projects, she responds to today’s social, political, decolonial, environmental and economic issues. Simultaneously as a PhD candidate at the VU Amsterdam, Pinatih is researching what Indonesian objects, that came to the Netherlands during colonial times, afford in contestations of belonging for young people who self-identify as Dutch-Indonesian.
Elena Khurtova (born in Samara, RU),is an interdisciplinary artist and researcher. Reflecting on the interplay of fragility and resilience of human and environmental conditions, her work explores the overlapping notions of care and control. She works across performative and sculptural installations, drawings and artist books, building poetic relationships with concrete and fluid materials and mapping the transience between human and nonhuman agencies. In her recent projects, she focuses on collaborating with soils.
Hannah Rowan (b. 1990 Brighton, UK) is a multidisciplinary artist based in London, UK. Her work explores the slippery complexities of water that draws together a liquid relationship between the human body and geological and ecological systems. She works across sculpture, installation, performance, video and sound to explore the uncertain form of materials. Rowan studied MA Sculpture at the Royal College of Art, London and BA (hons) Fine Art at Central Saint Martins, London.
