Middle Gate

The exhibition project Middle Gate II – The Story of Dymphna is a collaboration between M HKA (Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp) and the cultural centre de Werft in Geel. Middle Gate II is the follow up to the exhibition Middle Gate, curated by Jan Hoet in Geel in 2013. The exhibition concept is closely tied to the legend of the holy Dymphna, saint of the possessed, the mentally ill and patroness against epilepsy and insanity. The legend of Dymphna shares a strong connection to the identity of Geel, "the charitable city".

Hugo Roelandt

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(c)photo: M HKA, 2016

Zonder titel / Untitled, schoenen in plaaster / Shoes in Plaster (Solo-Performance Stadtarchiv Kassel), 1977

Hugo Roelandt

Object , 2 x (28.5 x 39 cm)

cardboard, plaster, shoes

(Remake for 10 years New Reform, Oud Hospitaal, Aalst, 1988)

Roelandt was never represented by a commercial gallery. He was not even interested in selling his work. Roger D’Hondt tells the anecdote that after the artist’s 1977 performance in Kassel a collector so insisted on buying the remains of it (a pair of old shoes in a box full of plaster) that Roelandt finally consented – in order to stop the nagging. In the artist’s archive two similar boxes were found – the remains of a tryout and a remake. Yet these are clearly exceptions; very few artefacts remain of his performances and installations. For Roelandt, art was always a performance, a temporary event, whose remains only have documentary value. (Marc Holthof, 2016)

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