Re-coding the Comatorium | Nabuurs&VanDoorn

Nabuurs&VanDoorn presented fragments of their Artist in Residence program at Nieuw en Meer exhibition space Kate. The show features a range of works, including a striking reproduction of a paper map of Amsterdam, annotated with online information gathered by the artists. Handwritten notes trace a golden line that stretches from their residency studio to the site where Californian artist Maria Nordman (MN) installed the nomadic sculpture “Tjoba” in 1982. The duo first learned about this extraordinary piece during a 2015 interview with MN, recognizing it as the first-ever nomadic artwork—a pioneering example that now inspires their own nomadic journey from one AIR to another, beginning at Nieuw en Meer.

The title of their solo show, “Re-coding the Comatorium”, takes inspiration from the Mars Volta album “De-Loused in the Comatorium” (2003). Omar Rodriguez Lopez (ORL), the band’s composer and guitarist, lived and worked along the very golden line mapped by Nabuurs&VanDoorn. As longtime fans of ORL’s work, they chose his Amsterdam sessions as the spark to explore the golden line. The concept of the “Comatorium”—an ephemeral state between life and death—resonates with the artists, reminding them of the elusive nature of “Tjoba”. As MN once shared, the sculpture never truly claimed its position in art history, existing between presence and absence. “Re-coding the Comatorium” becomes a tribute, a noble gesture to honor and acknowledge “Tjoba” as it lingers in the grey zone.

The artists divided the golden line into forty points, undertaking a series of on-site walks to each location. They mapped colors—red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple—to assign symbolic meanings to these points. After determining the color for each site, they photographed the location, searching for grids and frames within the urban landscape. Later, they digitally integrated the assigned color codes into the images.

Rooted in performance art, Nabuurs&VanDoorn challenge the truth value of documentation. As performance artists, they are familiar with the dilemma of losing control over how their actions are photographed, leading to uncertainty about the images’ intended meanings. This lack of control contrasts with the intrinsic desire to shape and frame artistic expression. By incorporating mapped color codes directly beneath the photographs of the golden line, the artists confront the viewer with an unsettling realization: what they see may not truly align with what they are looking at.