Tanja Engelberts

Tanja Engelbert’s work investigates the duality between the romantic landscape and its economic reality in today’s world. Places of interest range from rural Wyoming to the endless North Sea, landscapes that were once the source of prosperity and are now going through significant changes. 

Hollow is a portrait of an artificial Dutch island. It is shaped like a ring dike and serves as a dumping ground for contaminated sludge from Dutch waters that contain toxic substances.

In this video work the camouflage techniques that depict the island as an idyllic nature reserve are explored, as well as the monotony of actual islands making and the dumping of dredged material.

The island is a vehicle for Engelberts to develop a speculative vision of the future in text and image in which she, by thinking through geological time, wonders what happens to processes that people set in motion, but which have consequences that will manifest themselves long after our own deaths.

Credits

Title: Hollow Duration: 13’22” (loop)
Format: Apple prores / 16:9 Colour
Edition: 3 + 1 AP

Drone operator: Erik Hageman
Production support: Louke Wijntje and Elleke Hageman
Sound: Marcel Imthorn
Editing: Rento van Drunen

Special thanks to:
Rijksakademie van Beeldenden kunsten
Rijkswaterstaat midden-oost Nederland