Spent time framing the drawings and collages I made during our world trip in '16…
Squared
I started studying the way the Netherlands has changed in the last 100 years as part of my research into ‘Dutch Space is Different’. Never realised that a fat 70% of the non-urban space has been re-ordered and re-shaped in a period of no more than 80 years – from around 1920 up until 2000. It was the mighty – and almost noiseless – engine we call ‘ruilverkaveling’ that rolled over the land.
![](http://www.visual-art-research.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/ned-04-square-res.gif)
Land consolidation projects have rationalised, squared and straightened the countryside, radically adjusting agricultural farm structure in order to produce more efficiently. In later years other interests were added – historic patterns of land use, building new nature, tourism. But first and foremost, the straight line and the compact plot were king.
I happen to have firsthand knowledge of the process, having worked at the Dutch Kadaster and having been the boss-person of Kadaster land surveyors that powered the engine of redevelopment. I distinctly remember touring the semi-island of Schouwen Duiveland with my collegue from the Kadaster and the chairman of the Land Consolidation Committee. It was like driving around with God behind the wheel – for these two men, the land was plastic. They’d built a farm here, diverted a canal there, made a dike happen somewhere else. They never questioned the rightness of their effort – their right to re-make the land so it would bring forth even more potatoes, onions and turnips. I did have my reservations at the time, but the engine appeared un-stoppable.
Ruminating on this experience, I came to ask myself: what if we took this re-shaping of land one level up? In other words – what would the Netherlands as a whole look like if I applied a machine (an algorithm) to stretch its boundaries, flattten its shape, rationalise its contours? This led to a series of short stop-motion films that I’ve been having fun with all of last week. Posting one now, more to come a little later, I think.
By the way, the good people of WordPress need to re-think their strategy for moving GIF images – the WP way of dealing with images is not very user-friendly.