Berendine Venemans, our latest TAC-resident, is a creator who explores the emotional boundaries of artistic mediums. Her artistry, a vibrant amalgamation of performance art, poetry, and video work, operates on a deeply emotional and cognitive level. This approach not only enhances her creative process but also results in artistic outputs that tap into the unnameable aspects of human experience.
Berendine has left footprints in diverse artistic spaces. She has been part of the Parade in Eindhoven via Parktheater. Moreover, she also performed in The Big Art and Tiny Disco exhibition, an initiative of Inversie. Inversie is a talent development programme, facilitates artists by pairing them with mentors to guide them with their projects.
In her previous work, Berendine focused on a unique practice of turning her day’s mood into performative action. These raw emotional materials became the foundations of her work, often portrayed in video pieces. Her focus is not on creating art with a predefined message but rather on crafting experiences for her audience, challenging them to engage with the emotional layers of her creations.
Currently, she is exploring the physicality of performances; body research, how she moves in spaces and in relation to the audience during a performance. Her performance “Membraan” at De Parade exemplified this exploration, and she might perform this piece again at Urša Prek’s (another Tac-Resident) solo exhibition at the Albert van Abbehuis on 17 November.
Her art often explores the interface between the personal and the universal. Berendine is intrigued by the unnameable aspects of life – the elements that live beneath the surface, the feelings and embodied experiences that are challenging to articulate. The processes of personal growth, such as falling in love, the fear of things that might happen or dealing with loss, fascinate her. She seeks to make these nameable and experiential through her work, creating art that resonates on an intuitive, emotional level.
Photo by Marcel de Buck for Talenthub Inversie
Photo by Marcel de Buck for Talenthub Inversie
Before Berendine practiced her art she worked as a professional quest designer for Guerrilla Games and worked on Horizon among other things, she found herself grappling with burnout. This experience became a catalyst for her to recalibrate her life and pursue her artistic ambitions. She intertwines these personal narratives within her projects, creating a channel to connect from her inner world to the outside.
Her exploration of deep-seated anxiety, stemming from her personal experiences, serves as a tangible example of her approach. In her journey, she recognised a co-dependent relationship between fear and self, a dynamic that manifested in her art. Her exploration of the interaction between rationality, intuition, cognition, and embodiment is a defining feature of her artistic practice.
Berendine will continue her artistic journey this November
- 17 November the performance ‘Membraan’ during Urša Prek’s exhibition at Albert van Abbemuseum
- 18 november the performance ‘Dear Shapes in Space’ in the Neck of the Woods Gallery in Rotterdam
- 25 november the performance ‘Dear Shapes’ at V-fest
- In between, she has the working periods of INVERSIE.
She is also part of the UC Masters an initiative by e-moves, a two-year programme facilitating artists in their creative journey. Moreover, she is part of KONT Magazine, transitioning it from a magazine into an art collective, aiming to connect and inspire artists across different mediums.
In essence, Berendine is not just an artist, but an explorer of the human experience, probing the depths of emotion and cognition. Her approach challenges us to redefine our understanding of emotions and ourselves, affirming it as not just a medium of expression but also a means to connect, empathise, and most of the time it defines who we are and how we behave.
Header photo by: Cristina Materassi
