Untitled Reality TV Show

Starring Sophie Bates, Lizzy Deacon, Lou Hubbard, Aodhan Madden, Lorraine O’Grady, Charlie Prodger, Margaret Raspé, Julia Scher, Bein van Vilsteren and Geo Wyex, with a bulletin text by Zack Darsee


Episode synopsis: In a city archive, a single finding tag labelled ‘housewives’ is assigned to historical documentation pertaining to a former washhouse at the centre of a social housing complex. It's now years later, we’re situated in the Netherlands—a country eager for reality TV, responsible for originating global franchises like Big Brother, The Voice, Deal or No Deal and The Traitors—and the washhouse has become an art institution, perennially preoccupied with forms of artistic output. It is here, amidst the memories of real housewives that came before, that we first encounter MARGARET and SOPHIE, habitually recording their aspirations on hand- and head-held cameras, eager to inscribe what might otherwise be dismissed as female clichés into an economy of attention. Meanwhile, upstairs, CHARLIE and BEIN enter the frame, further complicating depictions of gender via a string of subjectivities that insistently shift and self-define. GEO leaves a prop from a past performance behind, a subplot of diversion unravelling as the climax finally arrives. Swiftly, LIZZY and LORRAINE turn the frame in on itself, moving from behind the camera to in front of it, the façade of the forth wall shattered as both get to work infiltrating class lines. And then, the new normal: JULIA and LOU lay agendas of manipulation and control bare, revealing their capacity to render us objects within a culture of transparency busy with one thing: surveillance. It is in these closing moments that the institution is forced to confront itself, implicated in its own practice of mediation by a confessional booth buried in the belly of its basement.

This central plotline unfolds across five floors—scored towards some kind of crescendo by AODHAN—yet surrounding it is an interrogation of the frame of mediation, wherein the team of the institution doubles as a crew intent on getting the story up and running. Except in doing so, nothing much changes, everything runs as it usually does save for some semantic substitutes, and the reality of the institution is revealed to mirror that of reality TV itself: a depiction of a society obsessed with its own mediation, stuck in a loop of endless discourse (Did you see…?, Did you read…?, Did you follow…?). The show is therefore not so interested in artists who work with reality TV as a material itself (though some appearing do), but rather aims to ‘set the scene’ of image construction. As it journeys on, it becomes increasingly populated by artworks and artistic processes that share approaches with various hallmarks of reality TV production—from strategising, editing and scripting to (over)producing affect, intimacy and selfhood—leaving viewers pondering how analysing the fiction of the frame might have a larger benefit for thinking through narrative manipulation more broadly.

As any true reality TV fan will tell you, the best characters are the most failingly self-aware—both consumed by and yet unable to register their reception—and the best moments are when it refers to its own construction. In this era of institutions equally obsessed with their own appearance—eternally busy putting narratological devices to work in attempts at managing redemption arcs worthy of sustained viewership—they become the often-unwanted mediator between artwork and audience, working hard to resolve any conflicts in meaning. And although the episodic structure of reality TV similarly relies heavily on the fabrication of conflict and its eventual resolution, there is no attempt at conclusion here. Instead, in this supposedly unscripted reality, an ensemble cast of artists is gathered together, and in the monitored environment of the frame, meaning runs amuck.


Executive producer: Isabelle Sully
Field producer: Ramón Jiménez Cárdenas
Post-production editor: Lisanne Janssen
Broadcast designers: Sabo Day with Augustinas Milkus
Show runners: Chryso Amaya Michailidis and Miriam del Seppia

An accompanying public program will take place throughout, featuring a series of tours by ‘friends of’ the artists, a recap talk by Misha Kavka, a finale performance of the show’s score by Aodhan Madden and a reunion featuring contributing artists, to take place after its fact in 2027.



Further notes on the program
Alongside the exhibition program, we host an annual residency aimed at engaging more directly with the residential context within which we reside. From October 2026 through to the end of January 2027, artist and designer Baby Reni is undertaking a curatorial residency under the guise of the fictional-but-functioning institution operating out of her living room, Baby Reni Foundation. Following this, we will open a solo exhibition by artist, writer and country music aficionado Steacy Easton, co-curated with Jacob Korczynski.

For more information on who we are and what we do, feel free to contact us or visit our website.