Mercedes Azpilicueta: CaccHho CucchhA

de Appel presents CaccHho CucchhA, a scenographic exhibition by Mercedes Azpilicueta that treats play as invention, disobedience, and commons making. Commissioned by de Appel, the project unfolds as an immersive ecosystem of modular sculptural costumes, play platforms and a large tapestry, activated through an ongoing series of workshops with children, families, and invited collaborators. CaccHho CucchhA is part of de Appel’s long-term commitment to embedded art and mutual learning, as well as hosting children and caregivers into the centre of artistic life and rethinking what behaviours, and whose tempos are supported in cultural spaces.

CaccHho CucchhA draws on Azpilicueta’s long-term research Bestiario de Lengüitas while shifting away from adult-centric frames. The exhibition invites visitors to inhabit a porous dramaturgy where children and adults collectively compose stories, gestures and sounds. The exhibition is structured around two guiding notions: cacho, a fragment of time that is immeasurable or leftover to be repurposed into something new, and cucha, a shelter or safe place. Here, every visitor’s contribution forms a cacho of a larger narrative, while the exhibition space of de Appel becomes a cucha: a hospitable environment for collective play, care and slow time.

The exhibition is shaped by barnacle interiors, referencing the medieval European myth of the barnacle goose (thought to grow from driftwood at sea), playground platforms inspired by Aldo van Eyck’s designs, modular sculptural costumes, and a large-scale tapestry. The abstract structures invite open-ended interaction rather than prescribe fixed behaviours. They invite children to build and unbuild tents and shelters. The fantastical wearable sculptural costumes range from Ripping Wings (repurposed tent fabric) and Rattling Roots (coconut fibre shoe-objects with bells) to Staccata de Hortensias (headbands that clap as the body moves). A ten metre jacquard tapestry brings together archival images, drawings, and references from different times and places in playful baroque-like assemblages that the artist used during her research. By juxtaposing images of children in Gaza, feminist movements in the Netherlands, Argentine poet María Elena Walsh, Aldo van Eyck’s playgrounds, medieval fools, mythical creatures and street festivals, the assemblage creates thresholds into multiple worlds. Birds, plants, folkloric rituals and Situationist references further enrich this irreverent dance of images, inviting audiences to engage, interpret, and collaborate on co-authoring stories about play, migration and disobedience among many other themes.

CaccHho CucchhA resists productivity-driven time. Instead, it privileges autotelic play (after Brian Sutton-Smith) and foregrounds play as identity and community-building, where rituals of weaving, listening, and moving build shared memories. The exhibition will be activated by a constellation of playshops: a set of participatory sessions, which include weaving, gardening, storytelling, movement, and sounding with children and parents. These activations extend across the exhibition weeks, allowing forms and meanings to shift with each encounter.

In preparation, de Appel hosted a reading group on play with the team and artists. The references were shared by educator Daniela Pelegrinelli to attune hosting practices to children’s tempos. The bibliography spans Johan Huizinga, Roger Caillois, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Loris Malaguzzi, Gilles Brougère, Brian Sutton-Smith, Penny Wilson and others, grounding the project in play theory and radical pedagogy while keeping the exhibition responsive to lived experience.

The Magic Circle: Playing Outside Time is a symposium on September 27, 2025, which gathers artists, curators, and theorists such as Choi Heong-uk, O(o)yster Moms, Maria Berríos, Zeina Maasri, Priscila Fernandes, Penny Wilson (Assembly Collective), Daniela Pelegrinelli and other guests to address: How do exhibitions for children reconfigure institutional norms? How can difficult subjects be introduced with care and complexity? Sessions consider disobedience as an artistic and curatorial tool, layered storytelling, and the ethical labour of hosting young audiences without oversimplification.

Commissioned and curated by de Appel. Produced in collaboration with Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein where the exhibition will be presented during late spring 2026. This project is supported by Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst, Mondriaan Fonds, Elja Foundation, Stadsdeel Zuid, Fonds Cultuurparticipatie, Iona Stichting and Stichting Zabawas.

Artist: Mercedes Azpilicueta. Mentorship in Play Theory: Daniela Pelegrinelli. Play structures design in collaboration with Katharina Kassinger. Play-wear sculptures and costumes design in collaboration with Lucile Sauzet. TextielLab Jacquard weaving with Judith Peskens. Studio production with Laura Fernández Antolín, Anna Klas, Natascha van der Boom, Katta Rasche, and Shreya de Souza. Visual identity by Vanina Scolavino. Research assistance and image sourcing: Laura Kneebone. Communications include a schools flyer campaign, a city poster run, and a riso-printed booklet that doubles as a wearable mask. Playshops with Mercedes Azpilicueta, Vere van der Veen, Raoni Muzho Saleh, Lina Bravo Mora, Antonella Fittipaldi, Gļeb(s) Maiboroda, Anna Klas, and others. Editorial advice Itamar and Neil.

Playshops & activations (selection)
Weaving & storytelling (10–12 yrs) / Seed-planting in the de Appel garden / Storytelling with children’s interventions / Movement sessions for children and parents / Sound-making/music with the costume elements / Making imagined dwellings / Wool filting.

For dates, schedules, and bookings: deappel.nl