The BARRA MOVEMENT (ft. Els Dietvorst): This is what you came for

Exhibition at Bozar: April 28–July 21, 2022
Exhibition at CENTRALE for contemporary art: April 28–September 18, 2022

From April 28, Els Dietvorst will be staging the double exhibition This is what you came for in two Brussels institutions, Bozar—in the mark of the BelgianArtPrize 2021—and in CENTRALE for contemporary art.

With This is what you came for, she created an immersive project, a total and polyphonic work of art in which the creative and participatory process for artists and spectators plays a key role. She deploys all the facets of her practice as a draughtswoman, filmmaker, sculptor and peace activist. This is what you came for embodies what Dietvorst defends with passion and determination: art as a social link, art as a shared experience. 

This is what you came for is a project that marks a new stage in her artistic career. It is a step that further highlights the practice of the BelgianArtPrize 2021 winner who is constantly questioning the limits of the artist's role in society.

Dietvorst does everything her own way, averse to a classic, commercial, or institutional approach. She opts for cooperation between these institutions and sees them as meeting places rather than exhibitions. In doing so, she takes her ephemeral art practice of creating and experiencing together one step further. Dietvorst works with her new collective, accomplishing simple actions with attention to rhythm and repetition. The artefacts and stories show traces of encounters.

This is what you came for is about removing boundaries. Her work invites us to be open and modest towards each other and our surroundings, so that everything has a right to exist, and everyone can be themselves.

For This is what you came for, she is surrounded by guest artists: Aurelie Di Marino and ACM (a homeless artist with whom she has already collaborated in the past) and she begins a dialogue "beyond death" with Philippe Vandenberg. The BARRA MOVEMENT, a collective made up of artists and students or ex-students of the Antwerp Academy, where Els Dietvorst is preparing a doctorate in visual art, accompanies her upstream and throughout the project.

The BARRA MOVEMENT, (Belgium) ACM, Sadrie Alves, Angela Alsouliman, Alex Akuete aka Xray, Simon Arazi, Stefania Assandri, Els Dietvorst, Aurelie Di Marino, Daria Likhovitckaia, Flor Maesen, Asia Nyembo Mireille, Laurence Petrone, Philippe Vandenberg, Y, Yi Zhang, Honey Zinzs. (IRL) Laoise Garvey, Maria Cahill, Annette Doran, Sandra Whelan, Aine O’Grady, Mary Verling, Fiona Power, Ingrid Schumacher.

The BelgianArtPrize
The BelgianArtPrize is a biennial Award for Contemporary Art open to Belgian and international artists residing in Belgium and to all art disciplines.

Since its conception in 1950, the BelgianArtPrize is more than just a prize. It aims at emphasizing the artistic relevance, innovative insights, diverse artistic practice and distinctive visual language developed by an artist at a specific time and within a specific context.

For the 2021 edition, an independent jury appointed Els Dietvorst as the laureate of the BelgianArtPrize 2021 amid a a selection of artists voted by a large panel of nominators made up of art professionals, curators, art critics and historians and collectors.

The laureate received an endowment of €20,000, the Crowet Prize. She was invited to create an artistic project with new work at the Centre for Fine Arts - Bozar in Brussels in autumn 2021. The Proximus Art Collection provided a production budget for the creation of artworks. Because of the pandemic, and the parallel solo project foreseen at the Centrale, the exhibition was postponed and Els Dietvorst proposed one global project for both venues: This is what you came for. For her show at Bozar, Els Dietvorst chose to present older works with recent and new creations, as to bring a glimpse – far from being retrospective - of her rich and multifaceted work.