For the twenty-eighth edition of Kunsthal Light, the artist Cindy Bakker is creating the site-specific work PLAY. The high walls of the Kunsthal’s HALL 6 – the twenty-five-meter-long display window along the ramp – remind Bakker of a bouldering gym, a place where she can be found on a regular basis. The experience of the sloping surfaces and the many diagonal lines – that appear to disconnect you from reality – inspire her to create a playful course. 

In PLAY, Bakker is creating a colourful composition with a combination of sculptures in various shapes. These are reminiscent of everyday objects like children’s sorting blocks, a doorknob, or an armrest; by making the objects abstract, visitors are never quite sure what they are looking at. In this installation, Bakker plays with the visitors’ experience. Stripped of their original function, what sense of recognition and which memories are triggered by these objects? 

Cindy Bakker

The Rotterdam artist Cindy Bakker (1989) graduated with a master’s degree in Fine Art from the St. Joost School of Art & Design in ’s-Hertogenbosch. Her work consists of large colourful sculptures, paintings, and installations for which she works with materials like plaster, styrofoam, acrylic, casting rubber, and wood. She is interested in exploring the boundaries between aesthetics and functionality. Bakker finds inspiration in random objects from the public space that were designed with a specific function in mind. In these objects she discovers an almost childlike aesthetic and a universal language, the everyday beauty of which she aims to visualise in her work. 

Artist Talk

Part of Kunsthal Light is a publication of the creative process as well as an Artist Talk, which for this edition will take place at the Kunsthal on Saturday 11 February 2023, during Rotterdam Art Week. More information will follow on kunsthal.nl/cindybakker