26 August, 9.45 a.m.
University of Amsterdam, BG2 008
This paper presents selections from En attendant (2024–ongoing), a multimedia environmental art research project centred on Nieuwpoort-Bad — a historically charged yet often overlooked coastal site permanently marked by its destruction during the First World War. En attendant brings together a range of interrelated visual and textual works, some of which speculate on the future of this dune landscape. The project adopts an explicitly ecological methodology, guided as far as possible by the principles of the sustainable darkroom. It also engages in a critical meta-reflection on the epistemological and ethical dimensions of environmental art research.
On the occasion of the IAWIS 2026 conference, Van Gelder’s installation In de duinen (2025); comprising 662 high-quality reproductions of vintage postcards depicting this area, will be presented in BG2 alongside P (N|N) (2025), a portfolio of photographs produced from a drifting position at sea that introduces a more-than-human perspective. Additional materials on display include an analogue slide sequence and a Super 8 film, both drawn from the family archive, as well as one of Van Gelder’s logbooks documenting her experiments with cyanotypes toned using self-produced botanical emulsions.
First exhibited in 2025 at KEI, a rehabilitation clinic in Koksijde (Belgium), En attendant engages with non-art spaces as sites of care. The paper reflects on what it means for an art historian to produce research-driven environmental art while simultaneously developing curatorial and textual strategies for its presentation beyond conventional art contexts. Delivered in a performative format, the presentation incorporates a short reading from one of Van Gelder’s Letters to Linda from Beersel, which accompany the visual materials. In doing so, En attendant makes a case for both imagining and claiming the right to more cautiously re-habit this very place.
