Alia Farid, a solo exhibition / Adriano Amaral, new work / An exhibition with works by Athos Bulcão, Marcos Castro, Anna Franceschini, Ni Haifeng, Nicolás Lamas, Praneet Soi, Adriana Varejão, Ana Vaz, Bouke de Vries, Raed Yassin, and Karlos Gil & Belén Zahera

You are welcome to join us on the afternoon of Sunday, January 19th 2020 to the opening reception of the winter exhibitions program at Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art in Rotterdam, which features:

An exhibition with works by Athos Bulcão, Marcos Castro, Anna Franceschini, Ni Haifeng, Nicolás Lamas, Praneet Soi, Adriana Varejão, Ana Vaz, Bouke de Vries, Raed Yassin, and Karlos Gil & Belén Zahera
This group exhibition explores the immigration of a form, and changing value systems that visualize national ideals and cultural identities. It focuses on blue and white ceramic to explore how “cosmopolitan” objects are rooted in a national project. This kind of ceramic is referred to as Blue Delft in the Netherlands. In other countries, this kind of ceramic also generally points to their original provenance or political geography, like Talavera or Iznik. The exhibition is organized by guest curator Bernardo José de Souza and Sofia Hernandez Chong Cuy, director, Witte de With.

Alia Farid, a solo exhibition
For her first solo exhibition in The Netherlands, Alia Farid presents a newly commissioned film installation, along with her film At the Time of the Ebb, 2019. Her new film is shot in Haiti, and centers on the country’s historic revolution. Her earlier film was also shot on an island; it is a melancholic meandering through the rituals of Nowruz Sayadeen ("Fisherman’s New Year") in Qeshm, Iran. In both works, Farid explores modernist tendencies to categorize personal and cultural identities, while also looking at how group rituals, social ruptures, and individual acts of resistance can admit but also escape definition. This exhibition is organized by Rosa de Graaf, associate curator, Witte de With, and co-produced in collaboration with Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis, USA, and The Power Plant, Toronto, Canada.

Adriano Amaral, new work
With an intuitive approach towards materials, Adriano Amaral creates immersive installations. He creates environments in which natural and synthetic elements merge, forming hybrids between technology and mysticism. His installation and sculptural works combine industrial and discarded personal objects; his paintings and videos combine imagery drawn as much from landscapes as from symbols. An entire new body of work is presented in his exhibition at Witte de With in Rotterdam, which then travels to PIVÔ in Sao Paulo. The exhibition is organized by guest curator Julia Mullié.

A series of public programs are organized in conjunction to the exhibitions. Please visit our calendar for more information. 

A press pack with images for all exhibitions and biographies for all participating artists can be downloaded here. For press requests or for further information, please contact Jeroen Lavèn via press@wdw.nl or call T +31 10 411 01 44.