AgriValley
two-channel video installation
16:9 full HD, 50p, 33:01 min
2022
This two-channel video installation captures the Netherlands’ current, yet futuristic, landscape through a purely cinematographic approach. The machines fill the space with images and sound and gradually the viewer see more and more interaction between man and the machine. The image rhyme emphasises both contrasts and similarities, and, at times, creates subtle absurdities. Sound plays an important role in this; the cadence of the machines together forms a new sound. Walking through the space, you experience the sounds of the different landscapes differently each time — thanks to the Dolby surround effect — and they tell the same story in different ways. The images and sound tell the story.

Cinematographer and film editor

Mirte van Duppen

Scenario

Lotte Lentes

Soundscape

Benedikt Wöppel

Color correction

Revolve, Frans Suijs

Producent

Paulien Mandos

Edit coach

Gabrielle Provaas

New Gardens of Eden
five-channel video installation
16:9 full HD, 50p, 00:52 min
2022
New Gardens of Eden illustrates the production landscape of the future. In this five-channel video installation, diverse landscapes merge into one whole. Indoors and outdoors, crops and animals, floriculture and food, man and machine come together in recurring images. Most of the elements used for modern agriculture are located on site and are interchangeable. The pink orchids connect visually with the pink LED light in the cultivation unit of the ferns. The yellow lines of the tomato greenhouse mirror the perspective of the architectural lines of the orchid greenhouse. The open-air cowshed, due to its construction, resembles a greenhouse. Further, the light and air by the asparagus grower corresponds to the sky by the cows. Even though man is not visible everywhere, he cannot be absent. Technology does not move by itself. While the labour may be distributed differently and the landscape shaped differently; zoomed out, the five different production landscapes form one singular horizon, that of the new Dutch landscape.

Around its own axis
Video work
16:9 full HD, 50p, 11:15 min
2020
Around its own axis showcases the infinite, repetitive rhythm of the automated Dutch agricultural landscape. In this video work, machines perform a dance, while the camera transports the viewer through landscapes of large displacements. Silent, monumental images evoking tranquillity are continually interspersed with more dynamic actions. Using the jargon of her profession, choreographer Pauline Roelants guides the viewer through the scenes — like a sports commentator — providing a blow-by-blow description of the movements of the machines and products. In doing so, the stillnesses and the silences of the landscapes, along with the impulsive actions and errors of the machine become an integral part of the choreography. Examining and describing the landscapes this way minimises the distance between creative man and pragmatic machine. Roelants’ movement analysis also reveals a minor dissonance: not every industrial act is perfect. A realisation both comforting and slightly comical. By approaching the movements of the machines and products like a dance, van Dupen reveals the poetry of a previously unnoticed landscape.

Cinematographer and film editor

Mirte van Duppen

Comments by choreographer

Pauline Roelants

Sound

Benedikt Wöppel

Color grading

André Badjebeir

Translation

Paulien Mandos

Edit coach

Gabrielle Provaas

Dancers breeder, Florensis, Hendrik-Ido-Ambacht en Dinteloord - orchids grower, Opti-flor, Monster - goat farmer, van Tilburg, Oude Dongen - tulip grower, Bloem-kwekerij Michiel Smit, Hensbroek - cow farmer, Christian en Sanne Klein Koerkamp, Lettele - plant grower, Pligt Professionals, ’s-Gravenzande

Simulated scent of a tomato greenhouse
Algoritmic Perfumery
O'dor Aroma Diffuser, a bespoke scent
2022
In van Duppen’s youth, her family would often drive from Tilburg to ‘het Westland’, entering a landscape replete with greenhouses. On these visits to her maternal aunt and uncle, who had an anthurium (floral) business, she never failed to explore their greenhouses. As a child, she remembers the excitement of the unknown landscapes; her senses triggered by the heat, humidity and smell.

Mirte van Duppen commissioned Algortimic Perfumery to capture the smellscape of a tomato greenhouse. This particular memory — a scent memory, is part of AgriValley Hotels, the video installation designed to engage multiple senses because images alone could never do the experience justice.

Pinkscape
light box, 50 x 64cm
2022
Pinkscape portrays the landscape of the simulated sunlight. This work is situated between the traditions of photography and of film. The image, which appears stationary at first glance, nevertheless moves subtly due to the diffusion of light. This distinctive light, with its fairy-tale pink glow, is the minimal light necessary for crops to grow. Plants only require red and blue spectra, not white light (which contains all the colours of the spectrum). Fewer colours translate into fewer costs, thereby allowing greenhouse growers to reduce their expenses. The lighting panels, floating over the ferns, mimic this diffuse light by spreading this ‘idea of sunlight’ as evenly as possible over the plants, like a blanket. The light source is on the side of the panels, whose laser pattern distributes the light in conjunction with a reflection plate. These lighting panels are also displayed in the exhibition.

Astronaut A4
cinematic tableau
16:9 full HD, 50p, 10:55 min
2020
Astronaut A4 is a cinematic tableau that depicts the milking robot 'Astronaut A4'.

Collages AgriValley
Hein van Duppen
paper & glue
2021-2022
The AgriValley project will be accompanied by a publication (autumn 2022), which various artists have been asked to contribute to. This includes artist and spatial designer Hein van Duppen, whose collages are part of the exhibition. The collages, comprised of different layers of books and magazines, create an environment in which animals and humans, as well as crops and machines all merge into a singular organism. This production landscape embodies both the present and the future.

Farmer
Hein van Duppen
31.5 x 46.9 cm
2021

photo album
Jan van Duppen
photos, 37 x 30cm
1982
Van Duppen's mother was born and raised in 'het Westland', a region well-known for its greenhouse horticulture. Here, her grandparents cultivated a wide array of crops (eg tulips, freesias, cucumbers, tomatoes and grapes). To mark the fortieth anniversary of van Duppen's grandparents, her father, Jan van Duppen, had a photo album made for their business. The album contains several chapters: such as transport, sale, grapes, currants, food, chemical pest control, biological pest control, work, harvesting, sorting and technology. Flipping through this album, many years later, brought back memories for Mirte. Memories of her childhood greenhouse visits, walking hand in hand with her father, as he regaled her with stories about the family's business. The memory became a reliving of Jan van Duppen’s experience. Just as her father had entered a new landscape and tried to make it his own, van Duppen also posed questions to the equally proud farmers of today’s landscapes. Her curiosity and wonder is based on capturing an image of the time, because technology is only a snapshot just like in the photo album.

EXHIBITION
21.05.2022 - 25.06.2022
Wednesday - Saturday, 12:00 - 17:00
Pennings Foundation
Geldropseweg 63, Eindhoven (NL)

exhibition made possible by Algoritmic Perfumery, Vitroplus, Pennings Foundation and JUMP

AgriValley is made possible by Creative Industries Fund NL, Impulsgelden Provincie Noord-Brabant, Kunstloc and Tilburg Makersfonds