Projects

Das Russendenkmal

2023
During a residency at Kunstdepot Göschenen in the Swiss Alps, we produced a series of watercolor paintings based on our study of what is locally known as "Das Russendenkmal" - an imposing sculpture hewn out of bare rock in the Schöllenen Gorge, where in the 18th century Russian troops clashed... Read more

Atlas de un Imperio de Papel

2022
Atlas of a paper empire (2022) is a cartography of the San Telmo ethnographic museum in Donostia-San Sebastián through the old maps from its archive. After digitizing the documents, the artists have created an algorithm that plots a random path across a world bound only by the limits of the museum'... Read more

False Flag

2021
The point of departure for this work is ‘Le Drapeau Noir’ (Black Flag), a relatively unknown painting by the Belgian surrealist René Magritte, which the artists came across during their research on art related to the Spanish Civil War. Produced in 1937, the canvas is said to have been inspired by... Read more

Onder de Vleugel

2020
An ode to Rotterdam under lockdown. This movie is the result of a collaboration between Iratxe Jaio and her 11-year-old son Iñaki, who could not go to school for weeks because of the pandemic. Read more

Alemanen kanposantue

2019
“Alemanen kanposantue” is colloquial Basque for “the graveyard of the Germans”. It is also the name given by locals to a memorial stele from the Spanish Civil War that stood forgotten and neglected by the side of a road in rural Basque Country, and into which once were engraved the names of three... Read more

La ruta más larga (The longest route)

2017
On Saturday October the 14th 2017, at 12:00, the artists Iratxe Jaio and Klaas van Gorkum are organising a round-table discussion at the Conde Duque Cultural Center in Madrid, with archaeologists, anthropologists, historians and journalists, about the problems caused by the lack of a common... Read more

Naturaleza Muerta con Recipientes

2016
An installation with objects of porcelain, cast from molds that were recuperated from an abandoned factory near Donostia-San Sebastián. This project is the third case study in our artistic investigation of the factory as a paradigmatic site of the twentieth century. Just like in our previous... Read more

The Loan Application

2016
A public symposium coordinated by the artists Iratxe Jaio and Klaas van Gorkum, on the implications of exhibiting the original artefacts from a contested archaeological discovery in a Museum of Contemporary Art.In 2016 the artists submitted a formal loan application to the Basque Government, in... Read more

Libro de los Plagios (Book of Plagiarism)

2016
A series of charcoal drawings, based on the images from the "Libro de los Plagios" (The Book of Plagiarism). This book was published in 1991 by the Basque sculptor Oteiza, as an indictment of what he perceived to be a flagrant plagiarism of his work. Read more

Nire ama Roman hil da (My mother died in Rome)

2015
Nire ama Roman hil da (My mother died in Rome) is an installation that consists of handmade facsimiles of the "exceptional" graffiti discovered in Iruña-Veleia, an archaeological site in Basque Country, and a video in which the inscriptions are deciphered by different experts in favour of, or... Read more

18 Aralık 2004

2015
18 Aralık 2004 is a collection of newspapers, all bought on the 18th of December 2004 around Taksim Square in Istanbul. Headline news that day was that the European Union had finally agreed to start accession negotiations with Turkey. On the accompanying video, two members of the communist party... Read more

Work in progress

2013
Work in Progress (2013) immerses itself in the manufacturing industry of Markina-Xemein, the rural Basque village where Jaio comes from. A video documents the mass-production of rubber car parts, following the pieces from the assembly line in a worker-owned factory to subcontracted workshops where... Read more

Últimas Palabras (Last words)

2013
In "Últimas Palabras" (Last Words), an actor and a speech instructor rehearse a text based on the final statement made by Alfredo Astiz at his trial. This ex-commander of the Navy during the last military dictatorship in Argentina is currently serving a life sentence for crimes against human nature... Read more

Kepala Batu (Head of stone)

2012
On National Liberation Day 2012, the former Van Heutsz Monument has been unveiled for the third time in its history. This time by spoken word artist Olympia Latupeirissa. At this occasion, she gave a rendering of the speech Foute Keuzes, which she developed together with the artists Iratxe Jaio and... Read more

Beursplein Hearings

2012
A series of hearings in the artists' tent in Occupy Amsterdam. Fellow Occupiers were interrogated by a rotating panel of four, on the dilemmas of maintaining a radically inclusive and participatory democracy, while keeping order in the camp and dealing with its social problems. The tribunal was set... Read more

Police Training

2011
Two instructors from the police academy teach the art of interrogation to a group of artists and students. They are given a training in cross-questioning techniques, and in dealing with violence. Through screenings, debates and relevant literature, the participants are stimulated to apply this... Read more

Producing time in between other things

2011
A project around the changing values of labour and property, examining the notion of artistic production through the resurrection of the woodturning hobby of a retired factory worker (Klaas' late grandfather). Read more

Local Ordinance

2010
During the city council elections of Rotterdam in 2010, six campaign billboards were clandestinely removed from public space, replaced with new ones, and mounted in a group show that examined the relationships between art and politics. Read more

Stay inside. Close windows and doors

2008
Neighbourhood residents were invited to join in a morbid parade that lead to the local shopping mall, where the participants, dressed up like bloodied corpses, would mingle with the startled customers, in a collective action between performance, dérive and street theatre. Read more

Meanwhile, in the Living Room...

2007
A full-scale reconstruction of an apartment that is being built in the new suburbs of Vitoria-Gasteiz, and guided tour leading from those suburbs to the exhibition space in the center of town. Read more

Let me hold your hand

2007
A monologue on love and loneliness, assembled from internet forum postings that deal with relational problems, played through secondhand telephones Read more

Of Marriages and Mortgages

2006
A collection of drawings, traced from videostills and digital documents: an ever growing storyboard that plots the uneasy relationship between the model and reality, between urban planning and concepts of life, family and reproduction. Read more

Home at Tent

2005
Using bluescreen techniques, the audience to an exhibition is cut and paste into a livingroom from the neighbourhood. Read more

OpTV

2005
A videoprogram assembled along themes such as social control, cultural confrontations, urban planning and its consequences for the inhabitants of a working class area in The Hague that was marked for large-scale demolition and renovation. Read more

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