| | | | | | | | | The Real Discovery, 2020 © Ana Núñez Rodríguez. | | | | | | | 8 April – 10 July 2022 | | | Bill Brandt » The Beautiful and the Sinister | | | | ... until 18 May 2022 | | | | | | | ... until 19 June 2022 | | | | | | | ... until 18 May 2022 | | | | | | Foam Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam Keizersgracht 609 . 1017 DS Amsterdam
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| | | | | | | | | | | | | | The red bags are used for the seeds, 2021 © Ana Núñez Rodríguez. | | | | | | Foam 3h: Cooking Potato Stories | | | | 8 April – 10 July 2022 | | | | Opening: Food tasting and tour through Cooking Potato Stories: Thursday 8 April on 19:00 CET | | | “When you say ‘potato’ the response is often an autobiography; potatoes provide a way for us to speak about ourselves.” Rebecca Earle (2019)
Foam proudly presents the exhibition of Ana Núñez Rodríguez. By collecting stories small and large, personal and historical, factual and fictional, Núñez Rodríguez investigates how “[t]he potato packs a universe of symbolic information on identity, domination and social differentiation.”
Cooking Potato Stories
The potato is cultivated almost everywhere, and globally cherished as an important part of local food cultures. What can a potato tell us about ourselves? Tracing the trajectory of the potato across the world, Ana Núñez Rodríguez asked herself this question. Núñez Rodríguez set out on a quest to unearth local ‘potato stories’ across the world, including her own childhood memories and her migratory trajectory between Spain, the Netherlands and Colombia. The resulting harvest of verbal and visual anecdotes, recipes, myths and memories surrounding the potato forms a mosaic of how the humble crop universally inspires cultural and individual identities. The many stories told in this exhibition present the humble potato as the product and cause of violence, famine and migration across the world. Yet they also talk about survival, sharing, belonging and family. The continuous transformation and adaptation of the potato becomes a metaphor for human resilience, and for how our identities are rooted in the stories we tell each other. | | | | | | | | | | Upside Down, 2020 © Ana Núñez Rodríguez | | | | | | Influences around the world
The artist’s family history is fundamentally intertwined with that of the potato. The crop was first domesticated in South America and was brought to Europe by the Spanish conquistadores in the 16th century. Through a process of cultivation and modification, it continued to spark unprecedented population growth in Europe and beyond, and radically transformed local cuisines. From fries to aloo, tortilla, gnocchi, or ‘stamppot’, the tuber has since been widely adopted as a national or local food in countries across the world.
However intertwined our societies and economies are with the potato, none can truly call them native. The story of the potato began long before the concept of nation-states existed, and the trajectory of the potato from the Andes into our kitchens was marked by many obstacles. It took centuries for the crop to take root in the cold European soil, and was initially valued for its decorative flower. The work of Núñez Rodríguez shows us that the story of the potato is one of continuous metamorphosis and adjustment to its local surroundings; a feeling that the artist (and many with her) can identify with. | | | | | | | | | | Who conquered who?, 2020 © Ana Núñez Rodríguez | | | | | | Ana Núñez Rodríguez is based between Europe and Latin America. She studied Documentary Photography and Contemporary Creation at IDEP Barcelona, holds a postgraduate degree in Photography from the National University of Colombia and holds a Master degree in Photography and Society from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (KABK) in The Hague. She was part of Lighthouse 2020-21, a program for upcoming talents at Fotodok, Utrecht.
This exhibition is made possible by the Van Bijlevelt Foundation and the Leeuwensteinstichting.
Acción Cultural Española (AC/E) supports the exhibition through the Programme for the Internationalisation of Spanish Culture (PICE).
Foam is supported by the VriendenLoterij, Foam Members, De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, the VandenEnde Foundation and the Gemeente Amsterdam.
In 2022 Foam receives additional support from the Mondriaan Fund. | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | Cuckmere River, 1963
© Bill Brandt / Bill Brandt Archive Ltd. | | | Bill Brandt » The Beautiful and the Sinister | | | | ... until 18 May 2022 | | | | Foam presents The Beautiful and the Sinister, an exhibition by one of the most critically acclaimed British photographers, Bill Brandt (1904- 1983). The exhibition demonstrates the close relationship between the art of the European avant-garde, in particular Surrealism, and his own work. From his earliest photographs in the nineteen-thirties, taken when he was still an amateur, to his portraits and nudes in later years, Brandt shows a permanent fascination with the strange. Departing from the notion that the sinister (more accurately in German: 'unheimlich') is an ever-present element of Brandt’s photographs, the exhibition shows how this characteristic manifests itself in both his photojournalistic and artistic photography. | | | | | | | | | Nude, Baie des Anges, France, 1959
© Bill Brandt / Bill Brandt Archive Ltd. | | | | | | | Bill Brandt’s work of the nineteen-thirties is characterised by its emphasis on social inequality in England during that time. By using his family contacts, he was able to visualise the extreme contrasts of wealth in British society. Brandt was most innovative in his photographic experimentation of nudes. These photographs possess a great symbolic significance that in many cases is related to elements taken from psychoanalysis and Surrealism, such as a strong lighting contrast, the inclusion of elements like images, mirrors or doors and windows as symbols of escape. Most novel was his use of a wide-angle lens. It reshaped and distorted the viewpoint of the naked figure. | | | | | | | | | Elephant & Castle Underground, 1940
© Bill Brandt / Bill Brandt Archive Ltd. | | | | | | | Hermann Wilhelm Brandt (1904-1983) was born in Germany to a British father and a German mother. In 1931 he moved to England where he initially became known for his photographs of British society. Later he made distorted nudes, portraits of famous artists and landscapes. His works exhibit important social commentary and a poetic resonance. His landscapes and nudes are dynamic and powerful, often using wide-angle lenses to create distorted compositions. Bill Brandt is widely considered to be one of the most important British photographers of the 20th century. | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | Face as mask II, 2018
© John Edmonds, courtesy of the artis | | | | | | A Sidelong Glance | | | | ... until 19 June 2022 | | | | John Edmonds (1989, US) is the winner of the Foam Paul Huf Award 2021. Part of this prize is the solo exhibition A Sidelong Glance. In his work, Edmonds examines issues of identity and power from an African-American perspective in an apparently simple yet essentially culturally complex way. | | | | | | | | | A guard for the gods 2020
© John Edmonds, courtesy of the artist | | | | | | | The African art objects Edmonds uses in the work have many facets. They function as symbols of traditional African cultural heritage or bearers of meanings of diaspora and memory. No matter what their exact reference is, they function as a means to explore subjects such as displacement and expropriation in contemporary society. Not only does Edmonds broaden the tradition of studio portraiture, but he also thoughtfully claims his place in rewriting the past and anchors it in our current world, where authenticity and identity are fluid. | | | | | | | | | Holding a sculpture from the ashanti 2019
© John Edmonds, courtesy of the artist | | | | | | The Foam Paul Huf Award is presented annually to a talented photographer under the age of 35. Foam has been organising this prize since 2007. The winner is appointed by an independent, international jury, with Edmonds being the fifteenth winner.
The Foam Paul Huf Award was made possible in part by the generous support of Mentha Capital.
Foam is supported by the VriendenLoterij, Foam Members, De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, the VandenEnde Foundation and Gemeente Amsterdam.
In 2022 Foam receives additional support from the Mondriaan Fund. | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | Jogos Dirigidos (Directed Games), 2019. © Jonathas de Andrade | | | | | | | ... until 18 May 2022 | | | De Andrade tells a story that can only be heard if you listen with all your senses.
Foam presents the 6h edition of the series Next Level, this time with artist Jonathas de Andrade (Maceió, Brazil, 1982). Andrade’s work is visually attractive yet highly critical. It creates a space for communities who are less visible in the socio-economic landscape, and less heard in the contemporary social debate. De Andrade is able to playfully draw attention to major themes such as social and economic inequality and unbalanced power relations. Issues that are deeply rooted in his native Brazil, but are also at play in the world at large. | | | | | | | | | | Jogos Dirigidos (Directed Games), 2019. © Jonathas de Andrade | | | | | | Nordeste
The work of Jonathas de Andrade is firmly rooted in the Nordeste, the north-eastern region of his native country Brazil. The region is fertile and the capital port of Recife has been an important trade hub since colonial times. The Nordeste is also home to many indigenous communities and has a great biodiversity, but the land is often exploited and its bounties are unequally distributed.
De Andrade addresses issues of social, economic and racial inequality that are – and have historically been – at the core of Brazilian politics. Collaborating with communities who populate the region, he amplifies the voice of those less heard. By focusing on local stories of identity and belonging, De Andrade playfully challenges the skewed global power dynamics that affect marginalised communities in Brazil, and the world at large.
Power Dynamics
De Andrade typically stages social experiments on locations where such power dynamics are at play. For the works in this exhibition, he collaborated with labourers from a sugar refinery, as well as a community of deaf-mute people in rural Brazil, and indigenous women from the highly contested Kayapó Menkragnoti territory. For his latest work, which premieres at Foam, he collaborated with the women of Tejucupapo, who continue to re-enact the battle against the Dutch colonizers that took place in their village in 1646. | | | | | | | | | | Jogos Dirigidos (Directed Games), 2019. © Jonathas de Andrade | | | | | | Visual Storytelling
Photography, film and installation are not solely used to record such events, but function as a method for visual storytelling. De Andrade unearths the histories that inhabit the land through playful and sometimes outright activist performances. The often staged and loosely scripted ‘documents’ hover somewhere in between fact and fiction. They tell us stories that have been told and retold, travelling and evolving with time. Language plays an important role in the oeuvre of De Andrade. He often combines photography and video with text, investigating how we internalize meaning through literacy. Taking his inspiration from vintage encyclopaedias, didactic tools and instruction manuals, he points at how language perpetuates social constructions in society. By recognising, isolating and reconfiguring verbal and visual typologies, De Andrade tells a story that can only be heard if you listen with all your senses.
Jonathas de Andrade
Jonathas de Andrade lives and works in Recife, in the Nordeste-region of Brazil. In 2013 he was selected as Foam Talent. In 2019-2021 his work O Peixe (The Fish) was part of the international travelling Foam exhibition On Earth – Imaging, Technology and the Natural World. De Andrade has had solo exhibitions in many prominent institutions, among them the Museu de Arte de São Paulo (2016-17); The Power Plant, Toronto (2017); New Museum, New York (2017); and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2019). His work will be presented at the Brazilian pavilion of the 2022 Venice Biennale. | | | | | | unsubscribe here
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