Reclamation

Reclamation is a novella about an artwork. The wide cover, inviting text, and full color illustrations create a pleasurable reading experience. The story blends fiction and reality into a whirl of histories—from present-day Almere, NL to the gold-rush days of Metropolis, USA. A chance encounter with an artwork in a vacant field sparks the narrator's curiosity. Her conversations and thoughts develop into a quest to uncover the stories and architecture of these two frontier cities. Through her experiences, we come to appreciate the eerie parallels of Almere and Metropolis. Both suddenly arose from vast twentieth-century land reclamation projects; but Metropolis is now a ghost town, and Almere is rapidly becoming the fourth-largest city in the Netherlands. Reclamation is based on a real artwork, formerly installed in public space in Almere, NL. The exhibition was co-produced by the Museum Paviljoens and the Jan van Eyck Academie.