AIR

logoairfinalArtist In Residence program (AIR)

The AIR program of the MI is open for anyone who would like to participate. Are you an artist, researcher, curator or an “in all manner of creative person”? Then this department might be the right place for you! 

Current residents:

Martine Mussies

After obtaining her MA in musicology, Russian literature and cultural analysis, Martine Mussies started researching mermaids in music. As an independent researcher, she is now working on a PhD on the topic of how modern media invite people to create new stories based on mermaid mythology. What fascinates her most about her subject is the way by which we shape fantastic creatures tells us so much about what it means to be human. Besides her research, Martine is a professional musician. Her other interests are gaming, crafting, reading, MOOCs, autism and karate.

Martine about her research:
“My personal experiences as a high-functioning Aspergirl, in teaching the piano to autistic children and in researching autism, have ignited in me a wish to critique current views of autism as a condition that renders the autistic as being more or less than human. With my research, I want to empower people to discover how the way in which they are misfits can be the way in which stand out and to show how technè can help the misfits fit in. To explore these ideas, I designed the symbol/image (archetype?) of the cyborg mermaid. In feminist studies, the figure of the mermaid has long been regarded as flawed, disabled and less-than-human. Her theoretical counterpart in that respect would be the cyborg, an image used to show that with the help of robotics, humankind could be larger than life. By combining those two images, we can explore the impact of cyborgization on “mermaids” — people who are considered as misfits — in contemporary society. As modern technology empowers people to create new and more powerful stories about ancient mermaid mythology, we see that by incorporating robotics in human lives, powerless mermaids can become powerful cyborgs.”

Eva den Heijer
All Art Derives From Play’ – a quote of Johan Huizinga (Homo Ludens, 1938), which Eva de Heijer totally embraces and tries to translate in her work as an artist and researcher.

Since 2004 she has a practice as a visual artist. In her two dimensional practise, she plays with and examines the way we perceive the world around us and how form and meaning are established. Parallel to this practice, she also designs applied games.

In 2013 she graduated with a Master’s degree in Education in Arts at HKU University of the Arts in Utrecht. She got introduced to the ‘ludodidactiek’ and graduated with the game ‘Tell your ARTtale’. A game designed to play in museums for Modern, Contemporary and Fine Art. And exactly according to the quote of Johan Huizinga, it is that perspective which is the core of the game.

Kian Dowlatabadi

In the Persian culture we say:
If you say something from your heart, it will definitely reach the heart of your audience.


Photo:
Somehow it is quite like embodying time which is marching around us. When my mind is clear enough about the world around me, that clarity reflects through my eyes and pass among my chest, finally reaching my heart. I do not take pictures so often, only when I am in harmony with myself and the rest of universe.

That is why pictures are my truth, my life.