Surviving New Land

Simulation of the extention of the harbour

This project was created for Portscapes a series of art projects alongside the construction of maasvlakte 2 in Rotterdam. The first part of Dijkman’s project for Portscapes was realised as a billboard image sited on the Maasvlakte inspired by, and titled after, the blank spots on old maps which declare “Here Be Dragons”.


billboard: 'Here Be Dragons'

These sea-serpent inhabited points of fearful imagination imply a gap in the understanding of the known world. She witnessed the early stages of the construction of Maasvlakte 2, when it had just emerged from beneath the sea, yet to be connected to existing land and surrounded by sand-breathing dredger-monsters. Through the motif of the dragon the artist introduces a means of considering Europe’s connections with Asia through trade, and the differing cultural traditions of the dragon as terroriser or guardian.



The second part, a looped film, was shot from a vessel which circumnavigated this island in a contemporary echo of a method of Dutch colonial explorers, who would make watercolour paintings as navigational aids to the new coastlines which they encountered. The ‘unknown island’ and new piece of the Netherlands is inscribed in Dijkman’s work with fresh mythological and fictional possibilities through the overlaying of soundtrack clips taken from various feature films. Suggesting how the new land exists most strongly in the realm of the imagination as a projection of both opportunity and trepidation, these fragments refer back to narratives of heroic discovery as well as marooned desperation.

Low resolution view: Surviving New Land


Marooned pirate, Howard Pyle, (1887)

A third element, a printed poster, connects these diverse elements which might be read as an implicit critique of expansionism against the contemporary legacy of the Dutch East India Company. We could come full circle, to an evocation of the now infamous islands off the coast of Dubai built in the shape of the countries of the world. Build by the same dredging companies as are working on Maasvlakte 2, as of the end of 2009 they are largely empty due to the credit crisis.
- Max Andrews (latitudes)

Download poster Surviving New Land (pdf)
   

Publication Portscapes:
The multi-part publication box includes a miscellany of contributions by the artists, a cahier with texts on the projects, the prologue publication presented with the launch of the project in February 2009 and a DVD with 'behind the scenes' footage with interviews with 'Portscapes' artists.