[spectre] (fwd) Sven Augustijnen's Spectres at de Appel, Amsterdam

[Andreas Broeckmann]

Solo exhibition Sven Augustijnen
"Spectres"
15 October 2011-12 February 2012

Opening:
Friday, 14 October, 6-9 p.m.

de Appel arts centre
Eerste Jacob van Campenstraat 59
Amsterdam
http://www.deappel.nl

The Belgian artist Sven Augustijnen (Belgium, 
born 1970) made his name with films in which he 
analyses cultural and historical places and 
events from a personal perspective, in a way that 
is at the same time very precise and ambiguous. 
This autumn, Augustijnen is presenting his latest 
film, "Spectres", as part of a solo exhibition in 
de Appel. In this film essay, the artist presents 
a controversial view of Belgian colonial history, 
a historical era that recently attracted a great 
deal of attention in the Netherlands following 
the publication of "Congo" by David van 
Reybrouck, who won the Libris prize. However, the 
questions raised by Augustijnen go beyond these 
national colonial events. How does a country or 
an individual deal with a colonial past? How does 
a nation process the suffering it has inflicted, 
dubious political acts or moral bankruptcy? Who 
is guilty, admits to guilt and what are they 
guilty of?

"Spectres" focuses on one of the darkest pages in 
the colonial history of the Belgian Congo in 
about 1960 in a documentary thriller, set to the 
music of Bach's St. John's Passion. Augustijnen 
follows Jacques Brassinne de La Buissière, a 
French-speaking Belgian who is now 82 years old 
and who was a high-ranking official when the 
prime minister of the Congo, Patrice Lumumba, was 
murdered in 1961. Brassinne conducted a personal 
investigation into the truth of this murder for 
thirty years. With his delicate psychological 
portrait, Augustjnen shows how the friction 
between personal involvement and an objective 
writing of history, between fact and fiction, 
truth and conviction, wholly obscures the 
question of guilt which arises.

The film is part of the overall "Spectres" 
project devoted to this difficult historical 
period, a project on which Augustijnen has been 
working in stages since 2001 and which has 
resulted in various works, which are shown in the 
exhibition. For example, they include the 
installation "Les Demoiselles de Bruxelles" and 
the newspaper supplement "Panorama", published 
with the Belgian newspaper, the Financieel 
Economisch Tijd, in which Augustijnen describes 
the interrelationship between the Belgian 
colonial issues and the history of the creation 
of the European Union.

The title of the project and the film are derived 
from the book by Jacques Derrida "Specters of 
Marx. The State of the Debt, the Work of 
Mourning, and the New International" (1993) in 
which the French philosopher discusses, amongst 
other things, the returning ghosts, the spectres 
of the past, which reappear in the present again 
and again. Augustijnen's project shows that 
Europe has not yet come to terms with its 
spectres, a colonial history which still has an 
impact on our lives, our way of thinking and our 
actions. In a time when the multicultural society 
appears to be under fire, a film about the way in 
which the West deals with "the other" is all the 
more relevant.

Events:
A side programme is organised in the context of 
the exhibition, in collaboration with the 
Tropenmuseum, the University of Amsterdam and 
Marres.
- Guided Tours
- Sunday School 12 February 2012, 4pm
More information at http://www.deappel.nl

The "Spectres" project was set up with the 
support of de Appel arts centre and the Marres 
Centre for Contemporary Culture (Maastricht). In 
2011 it will be exhibited in various forms, 
amongst other places, in Wiels (Brussels), K9000 
Kunsthalle Sankt Gallen and Kunsthalle Bern.

Concept and image Sven Augustijnen
Production assistent Fairuz
Editing Mathieu Haessler and Sven Augustijnen
Sound recording Benoît Bruwier
Sound mixing Original Flavour
Music J.S. Bach

Produced by Auguste Orts, co-produced by Projections, Cobra Films and Jan Mot
With the support of the Flanders Audiovisual 
Fund, CERA Partners in Art, Mu.ZEE, 
Kunstenfestivaldesarts, Koninklijke Vlaamse 
Schouwburg, WIELS Contemporary Art Centre, 
Vlaams-Nederlands Huis deBuren, de Appel arts 
centre, Marres Centre for Contemporary Culture, 
Vlaamse Gemeenschapscommissie, Kunsthalle Bern, 
Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen, Kunstencentrum BUDA, 
FLACC Workplace for Visual Artists, Fonds 
Régional d'Art Contemporain - Région Bourgogne, 
Le Fresnoy studio national des arts contemporains.