Each of the eight unique sculptures of Zelf is modelled to fit perfectly inside an existing, secondhand case. All of them are temporarily owned by eight different neighbours of the exhibition space. During the exhibition’s opening hours, visitors of the exhibition are invited to ring the neighbours’ doorbells and ask them to show their object. Inside the exhibition, a pile of flyers states the exact addresses, and a video is playing that shows a compilation of the neighbours’ first reactions to the sculptures and their expectations of the visits.

Hreinn Friðfinnsson (artist and one of the participating neighbours): “In a way it is very much nothing, it is just itself. So you are a little bit lost and then you are supposed to react! I think I’ll say as little as possible because I have no explanations. I think you will think about it afterwards: what was that now? I think it will come back to you, you know? (…) I like it, I like it very much.”

Zelf was created for ‘The future of what’, a duo exhibition together with artist Mariko Kuhawara at Corridor Project Space in Amsterdam.

Reviews: Kunstblijfteenraadsel, Parool

Between 2020–2021 I adapted this work to become an autonomous short film titled Zelf in een doosje.