MVRDV has joined the Van Gogh Homeland Foundation to develop the first Van Gogh Homeland Biennale to bring awareness to the challenges faced by the Brabant region. At the initiative of Midpoint Brabant, the experience strives to combine knowledge of architecture, landscape design, and sustainability to reignite enthusiasm for the Brabant landscape, Vincent van Gogh;s native Dutch province. According to the organisers, the region is facing a number of threats, including the increasing number of floods and the limited availability of space, but, through an orchestrated effort, the landscape that inspired van Gogh 150 years ago can become more sustainable and greener in the future.
The initiative, realised in collaboration with the regions and municipalities of Brabant, is divided into three parts: the Van Gogh Homeland Experience, an attraction point developed with Efteling; the Van Gogh Homeland Biennale, and the Van Gogh Homeland Atelier, a hub for knowledge transfer where the attraction and the biennale will be developed. The biennale is the first event planned for 2025. Architect Winy Maas, founding partner of MVRDV, has been invited as the first curator of the event.
The Biennale is planned as an outdoor exhibition full of temporary installations that showcase elements of the typical Brabant landscape. Visitors will have the opportunity to go on an expedition through temporary super dunes, horticultural towers, rain chambers and heather houses placed throughout the landscape. All of these interventions, inspired by Van Gogh’s vision of the region’s landscape, aim to explore the limits and opportunities of using the landscape in various ways.
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If you think about the climate challenge, you have to dare to think big. Exploring so many possibilities can get the ball rolling. Our outdoor exhibition will soon consist of numerous pavilions that will be placed in the landscape, like a string of beads. We do not give visitors a moralistic message, but let them feel climate change - the dryness, the wetness. We also show possible solutions such as a garden tower or a super dune. In my opinion the task for the coming period lies in the interweaving of city and nature, and of nature with city. We must be open to a critical approach to each other’s ideals. - Winy Maas
Recently, MVRDV has also revealed its design for an extensive renovation project for the Theater Koblenz, in Germany, and the masterplan design for the expansion of the Noviotech Campus in Nijmegen, in the eastern region of the Netherlands. Additionally, the firm has also recently won a competition to design the Innovation Park Artificial Intelligence Campus in Heilbronn, Germany.
Project Credits:
- Architect: MVRDV
- Founding Partner in charge: Winy Maas
- Partner/Director: Gideon Maasland
- Design Team: Gijs Rikken, Rik Lambers, Bin Wei, Karolina Duda, Kristina Knauf, Mark van Wasbeek, Natalia Lipczuk, Yayun Liu
- Visualisations: Antonio Luca Coco, Stefania Trozzi, Jaroslaw Jeda
- Copyright: MVRDV Winy Maas, Jacob van Rijs, Nathalie de Vries
