‘Poptahof 140’
The space I enter is empty and green. ‘Kermitgreen’.
The former owner(s) weren’t afraid to use color. I open the balcony-door. The master bedroom is babyblue, the other two little rooms yellow and orange. Orange with silvery dots. There is no furniture left. There are curtains, but no carpet. I don’t find any personal belongings in the closets except a broken cd-rack. All the cupboards in the kitchen are empty.

I sit on the concrete floor and empty my two bags with stuff I thought that would be handy. My camera, a cup, scissors, tape, tea, a towel, a spoon, coffee, soap, toilet-paper, krentenbollen, binbags. I spread everything on the floor and stare at the green Kermitwall.
Outside children are yelling.
Then I inspect the toilet and place my toiletpaper in position.

The next days I make the place my own. I bring more stuff from home. Even a vacuum-cleaner. I put my stuff in the kitchen-cupboards, hoover the floor, sit on the balcony, take pictures, write in my diary. I walk around, picknick outside, watch the softballgame and the shops. In a brochure I read about the future plans for the Poptahof-area.
It’s unreadable.

I’m an artist. That’s why I got the key of this empty house. That’s wat a lot of artists do. They travel and work in places like this. To get inspiration? To get involved in a neighbourhood? Or just a cheap way to work? The people around me will have to move within a short time. Where will they go? What will happen? They live here. I’m just a passer-by.
I take out all the shelves of the closets and place them on the ground.
Then I take a picture of it.

Astrid Dekkers (NL, 1971) studied history at Leiden University and Fine Art at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague. People and their lives are the subjects of her works. She’s intrigued by the traces people leave, the places they live in and the tension between an inner and outer world. She makes installations, drawings and little books. The meaning of objects and the meaning of words play an important role in her work. www

When Jimini Hignett heard she would have an empty apartment to work in for 4 months she knew straight away what she should do. Upon receipt of the key to the apartment she would offer it to a family of refugees so that they could live there! Unfortunately, logistically none of this worked out. Instead Hignett met Barbara, a homeless woman from Washington D.C. who left everything behind and came to the Netherlands because God sent her a message through a dream! In apartment 636 she talks (and talks) about her life in the video ‘Godsend’. www

FLAT_life: There is always a possibility of meeting other people.

We see a building that is going to be demolished. We are in an abandoned house. Who lived here before isn't here anymore. We cannot reach her or him.

The only way to reach out is by imagination.

There is a space that is empty, that we can fill with our fantasy. We can imagine lives. We can think of details. Like whether someone would love to eat banana-ice, or have the cat on his lap while watching TV, or taking of his shoes in the house. We can imagine the facts like date of birth, name and family. And we can imagine emotions and decisions.

I will present an imagined life of a fake person, and I hope the imagination of the viewer will take the fantasy even further.

Because what is the building without lives of all these people?

It is an empty book, we can freely fill.