M HKA is the Museum voor Hedendaagse Kunst in Antwerpen or Museum of Modern Art of Antwerp. It presents its programme for the first half of 2024. 

“We welcome Jim Shaw to the M HKA, an American cult artist who interweaves tradition and innovation, pop culture and politics, social criticism and humor. Ecology and aesthetics are also central, with presentations and projects by Viktor Brim, Willy De Sauter, Edith Dekyndt, Jef Verheyen and Antje Majewski. We invite you to come together and meet each other, at one of our parties, tours or lectures.”

‘Jim Shaw – The Ties That Bind’

“One of the most influential living artists in the United States is coming to Belgium. At Jim Shaw you can expect large immersive installations, paintings and drawings full of references from American popular culture. A mini museum of historical wigs, satirical drawings with Trump-like figures or installations with twisted vacuum cleaners: you cannot help but get lost in Jim Shaw’s allegorical dream world.”

‘Viktor Brim – Beyond the Depths’

What does human action represent compared to the centuries-old history of rocks? Viktor Brim takes over the museum’s In Situ space with his video installations: it becomes almost as dark as his films. Brim was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, and lives in Cologne, Germany. He made recordings of diamond and coal mines in Siberia, Russia or Germany and shows how people ‘bury themselves’ in the landscape.

Collection and archive presentations

Willy De Sauter has been an established representative of fundamental art for 85 years. His oeuvre excels in stylistic unity and formal simplicity. Modernist architecture is an important source of inspiration, he is also a master at playing with light and shadow and with line patterns. In this presentation you can get to know his work through some early key works.

The liveliness of matter or the volatility of natural phenomena: that is what fascinates artist Edith Dekyndt. 

After her visit to the Bourse de Commerce in Paris, she brings her work to the M HKA, in particular the three-part installation ‘Chronology of Tears‘. In the exhibition space hangs a wool blanket with a fine layer of copper on one side. With that blanket, Dekyndt conducted visual and auditory experiments, which produce sparks in a slide projection and a video.

Extended due to success: in the archive presentation ‘Choosing Art‘ you will discover which exhibitions for contemporary visual art were on display in 1993, the year in which Antwerp put itself on the international map as a cultural capital. Prestigious exhibitions were organized at the Middelheim Museum, the KMSKA and the M HKA, many of which have remained on permanent display.

‘Jef Verheyen – Window on infinity’

For years, M HKA contributor Annelien De Troij worked on the archive of Jef Verheyen, master of the neo-avant-garde. She also highlighted the new art experience that Verheyen proposed. 

More than on the visible world, he focused on a sense of spaciousness and on the essentials of painting: light and color. Thanks to a collaboration with the KMSKA, De Troij’s research is now made visible in a major retrospective exhibition, in which contemporary artists will also enter into dialogue with Verheyen. The whole thing promises to be a captivating aesthetic experience.

Superhost: Antje Majewski

“In the cities where she is a guest, Antje Majewski plants new trees of historic apple varieties. Antwerp will also gain a few unique trees this year thanks to Majewski”, M HKA exclaims. 

“The artist will be our Superhost of 2024 and will focus on the apple, as an art object but also as a case study of our endangered biodiversity. In a kind of ‘apple museum’ she shows works of art by her sparring partner Paweł Freisler, Jimmie Durham and Agnieszka Polska. The apple will never be the same again.”

Activities

The M HKA alsi boast a series of (one-ff- activities. 

To start: Art’s Birthday. On 17 January, the museum will be one big party, with performances and a real ‘games room’ in the exhibition halls. You can even have your future read out in a tarot reading or palm reading. Everything is in the spirit of artist Robert Filliou, who in 1963 declared his own birthday the birthday of art. The M HKA concludes with cake made by artist Tramaine de Senna.

You can continue partying at the opening on Thursday evening, 8 February. 

“Then we inaugurate all new exhibitions with a drink. Meet the artist? It’s possible! Jim Shaw is a barrel full of references, facts, associations and deep insights: you can hang on his every word for hours. He is in our country on the occasion of the opening, and the 71-year-old artist will give a lecture on Saturday afternoon, 10 February. Combined with his exhibition, this provides an absolutely unique opportunity to meet Jim Shaw.

Viktor Brim will also personally explain his In Situ presentation. 

“We simultaneously propose the publication around Eurasia. Eurasia is an Old World landmass that precedes constructs such as Europe and Asia and which for millennia has fostered the exchange of objects, practices, people, and ideas, leading to great philosophical and cultural advances. The evening will certainly provide food for thought, more information will follow soon.”

“If you like a quiet museum, it is best not to visit during the school holidays… Then our museum becomes a sanctuary for children. Teenagers can follow artistic workshops led by an expert during the Spring holidays. Go for collography, green screen photography, or tufting: making wall decorations with wool and a ‘tufting gun’. More information and registration can be found here. There will again be a studio for the younger children during the Easter holidays. This will take place from April 8 to 12, and you can register very soon.”

This spring we will again organize guided tours especially for toddlers. Finally, the museum will continue to organize a tour of the Panamarenko House every Saturday afternoon. Book quickly, because places are limited.

Art and museums in Antwerp

• A visit of the Flemish Tram and Bus Museum – Vlaams Tram- en Autobusmuseum (VlaTAM) in Antwerp.
• MUSEUM AAN DE STROOM | ‘City at war, Antwerp 1940-1945’.
• ANTWERP | Discovering queer(ed) art with the Queer Tour at the KMSKA fine arts museum.
• REVIEW | Illusion Antwerpen, an active and photogenic museum.
• Antwerp museums and sports facilities team up with European Disability Card for accessible leisure activities.
• FOMU 2023 | Reimagined collection, strippers – Nicaragua – Kurdistan and people touching each other.
• ANTWERP 2023 | MoMu fashion museum presents IO Van Oostveldt and Man Ray exhibitions.
• Inside the KMSKA or Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp.
• Museum Mayer van den Bergh.
• ANTWERP | ‘Stories of Refuge’ exhibition at Red Star Line Museum.
• 2024 at the museums of Antwerp ft. Ensor Year.
• 2023 at the museums of Antwerp.
• 2022 in the museums of Antwerp.
• ANTWERP | ‘Stories of refuge’ exhibition at Red Star Line Museum.
• ANTWERP | Inside Rubens House.
• ModeMuseum MoMu – Fashion Museum Antwerp 2021.
• ModeMuseum MoMu – Fashion Museum Antwerp 2022.
• Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp.
• ANTWERP | Museum Vleeshuis up for restoration.
• BOOK | ‘Antwerp. An Archaeological View on the Origin of the City’ by Tim Bellens.
• Red Star Line Museum.
• Paleis op de Meir. 
• DIVA, Antwerp Home of Diamonds.
• ANTWERP | Red Star Line Museum of (e)migration.
• ANTWERP | Museum Mayer van den Bergh is expanding into former District Hall.