For the first time in Northern Europe, Amsterdam-based art collective Studio Drift presents a solo exhibition of their work. Held at the Amos Rex in Helsinki, the exhibition ‘Elemental,’ features the work of Lonneke Gordijn and Ralph Nauta in a bid to explore the basic premise from which all living beings operate – as single entities attaching themselves to larger contexts.
Founded in 2007, Studio Drift works across a range of media, navigating the boundaries of art and technology with great ease. In recent years, their cross-disciplinary art practice has moved increasingly towards large-scale installations that translate complex natural processes into visual poetry.
The centrepiece of the exhibition is Drifter, a utopian vision of a concrete monolith floating silently towards an unknown destination. The literary classic “Utopia” (1516) by Thomas More is a key inspiration for this work.
More envisioned a society with gender equality, no private ownership, and where anything that can be imagined can be built with the help of a malleable miracle material. Through the act of imagination More seemed to have anticipated concrete 200 years before it was invented. In questioning our present state and imagining the future we can prompt innovation and change the world.
Materialism, their most recent work, has been extended especially for the exhibition to include new art pieces based on everyday objects of Finnish culture, such as a Nokia phone and a pair of Fiskars scissors. Materialism is an ongoing research project in which Studio Drift explores the everyday ‘made objects’ that surround us, by ‘de-constructing the constructed’.
“As humans, we create systems or technologies to gain mastery over our environment to evolve, realize dreams, create a brighter future and on a very elemental level: to connect,” said Studio Drift in a statement. The exhibition will run until 19 May 2019 alongside the first show in Finland dedicated to the Belgian painter René Magritte.