MASTHEAD
SNACK Magazine is a bi-monthly, contemporary magazine that reflects on the accelerated society and digs out the pearls from everyday life. SNACK documents, presents and reflects our zeitgeist: consumerism, trends and human contact are increasingly under influence of ephemerality and brevity. This results in waste, a short attention span and a mildly unsatisfying aftertaste. SNACK sheds a inquisitive and poetic light on this side of experiencing everyday life.
FOUNDER
Lauranne Cox PHOTOGRAPHY
Brussels Bikerlanes | Josworld | Jan Crab | Boris Baltschun | Kristýna Holubovå | Jelle Goossens | Tomek Rudka | Laura van der Wegen | Sebastiaan Janssen | Lauranne Cox | Joseph Gallix | Petros Efstathiadis | Raw Color | Lauren Davies | Marshall Astor | Odette Dijt | Yvette Jongen ART DIRECTION
Lauranne Cox CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
Jeannine Julen | Sebastiaan Janssen | Yvette Jongen TRANSLATIONS
Lauranne Cox PRINTED IN
Mediatheek, first floor, WdKa
SNACK would like to thank every contributor and contribution that made this a worthwhile journey. For those not mentioned yet, SNACK would like to thank in a non-particular order Marion Cox-Backus for non-stop input and care, Laura van der Wegen and Julia Serwinski for overall stardom and fellow-Forecastinors Eva, Iris & Melissa for neverending gentleness, Judith Lohuis and her mother Siny Lohuis for brilliant idea-giving, and lastly Joseph Gallix for the initial inspiration of his design. This issue is dedicated to my late grandmother, who always insisted on knocking on every door in order to make things happen. SNACK Blaak 10 3011 TA Rotterdam tel. +31 (0)6 30811472 www.snack.com Reproduction of any part of this publication is strictly prohibited without prior permission from the publishers including all logos, titles and graphic elements. All rights reserved Copyright 2014 by Lauranne Cox. Printed in Rotterdam
no flash please! museum guards
momentary monuments
words: Yvette Jongen & Sebastiaan Janssen
I took this picture in the Spring of 2013 in Sarajevo, where I have been living for the past 18 months. While the Sovjet Union produced Ladas and Volgas and East Germany was putting Trabants on the market, the Yoguslav carproducer Zastava was manafacturing the Yugos for decades. Nowadays, after more than twenty years, in post-breakup Yugoslavia these cars can still be spotted in all individual states. Many models are more than thirty years old, but with a bit of love, motor oil and decent technical skills, many YugoĂs still work like a charm. But not everyone drives these cars out of nationalistic pride or sentimental reasons. For many it is the only option. Most of the independent states that rose into existence after the breakup in the nineties had a
bad economic start. High unemployment rates, corruption and poverty still are skyrocketing in this region, especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In this context driving anything but a Yugo is considered fancy. The owner of this Porsche has a DIY-attitude that I like very much and a selfdeprecating attitude towards reality.
The Netherlands are a spotless and sorted out country. Despite our daily efforts to find stuff to complain about, most processes are running smoothly in our country. But because of our organizational inbred, chance is a fine thing. Everything is laid-out, which makes our country, just like its landscape, pretty plain and boring. Could this be why we feel the need to nit-pick?
A far less predictable atmosphere can be experienced the moment you cross Belgian borders. Building regulations are far less strict as there is more freedom to build on real estate. The arbitrariness as a result conveys a rich tapestry: hypnotic constructions, grotesque facades and well-intended extensions. Pleasing to the eye? Often not. But you will never get bored, driving through the Belgian linear settlement. The same atmosphere is tangible in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In the capital many quarters embrace these small and often surprising elements. Apart from the many improvised solutions for daily problems, small turfs of public space can be discovered, abandoned and disowned, like mini-states in their own. You will find abandoned building sites and other unfinished schemes of which this leverage (left) is an example. A few years ago it was installed with much ado. Soon afterwards it became clear that the driveway was not completely closed off by it. In the Netherlands the person in charge would have been pulled aside and it would have been instantly replaced. Here it is left unlaltered. And why not? Technically speaking, it does the job. Aside from functionality, these imperfections are a perfect antidote for any peeve.
Photo: Jelle Goossens | Steady & stable
An average dictionary demands a lot of space to explain the meaning of the phenomenon ‘gemakzucht’ (idleness) in a clear manner. The irony is that we are ever so much in need of easy fixes and creative solutions. Is an average life not busy and hectic enough anyway? It makes you think. In the daily humdrum we are looking for the easy way out; taking shortcuts in writing our Whatsapp messages, omitting capitals and comatas in an email and eating our prepacked food on the commute home. Why is it then that we as civilised urbanites become enraged with small urban interventions that are fixing some need with a practical bandaid?
Maybe it could be interesting to look into the concept of aesthetic arbitrariness. Surely, if we take time out to carefully define a dictionary term, we definitely would not be awake at night because of a trash bag covering a traffic sign to the closed down A2 or contradicting traffic signs. Embracing a bit of arbitrariness makes life ever so much easier.
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words: Lauranne Cox | photos: Laura van der Wegen & Lauranne Cox
After working in a laboratory for twenty years, I changed jobs because the company closed down. I was retrained as a security guard and after my traineeship of five months, I stayed put in Boijmans. I have been working here since 14 months. I have come to love museums: my favourite art is by Dali and Monet, which is on floor P7, guardcode for the Impressionism and Surrealism floor. People do not know that we do a lot of different things here: aside from surveillance and circulating floors every half hour, we work in reception, the office and check bags. Visitors are not too happy with that: a bag bigger than a A4 format is simply not allowed. But would you know that recently a visitor with a small camera bag was even able to set an alarm off: she managed to brush against one of the frames with her bag, fortunately not leaving any marks.
I remember people by their bags. I love bags myself and I see a lot of nice ones coming by. As a guard you need a point of recognition to remember people by. We never had extreme occurrences, but we need to stay alert for sure. A while ago we had a vsistor looking at the side of almost every frame, perhaps to check for an alarm. These things need to be reported to the control room. You never know.
The job of museum guard is burdened with the clichÊ of someone sitting in a corner, shielded by a formal dark suit and their crossword puzzles, waiting until it is five o’clock. In het Nieuwe Instituut we work in hospitality: you are a host or hostess. We do not have to be physically present in the exhibitions; we operate in the open visitors space. Exhibitions are also put together as to not needing a guard on watch. I have been working here for 17 years an do not have a cultural background. I have worked in technical support for an international bank, before interviewing here for the opening of head of security support. This vacancy had lots of common ground with my previous job at the bank, funnily enough. Being a hospitality worker means welcoming and attending to visitors, discussing hosting opportunities, helping out library visitors, selling tickets and providing information in every possible way. For security reasons we do keep an eye out with help of cameras.
When I started out, I did not have a real connection to architecture and design, but I have developed an affinity. One exhibition was very special to me, - Het Stadion. This exhibition in 2000 was on the architecture of football stadiums and the employees were asked to bring personal football items such as banners and shirts to help furnish it. The exposition brought together two unlikely worlds: culture and football, but people had great response to it. Another unique event was the holding of the world record of body painting, which was set here. We do a lot of events, debates and talks here, even fashion shows, but this was pretty wild. The whole of the ground floor was covered with models and paint. It just goes to show that it is a dynamic institute: we have had the pavilion next-door built in less than three weeks.
I have been working here in het Stedelijk Museum for over two years. My background is in art; I have been a visual artist all my life. As an artist I create art for the public domain. For instance, if an planned elderly home has an art budget, an art foundation like SKOR will manage this with its artist. With a group you draw up some plans and if lucky, these get picked out. There was a group of us in the WIK (artist’s financial support), but when this was halted by the government, we were offered a retraining as guards. I like all the art we have here, modern and premodern, but my favourite work is the Cathedra (1951) by Barnett Newman, which was attacked by a visitor. The blue colour sucks you up and keeps floating around you like a whirlwind. And if you look closely you can still see the horizontal knifemarks.
Marlène, 53
BNN’s ‘Spuiten en Slikken’ (Dutch talkshow on sexuality and drugs) caused a small stir last year in the museum. They had a lady roll around in paint, smeared her body on a canvas and hung it in between the paintings here, as a stunt. This happened during my shift, I was just around the corner when it happened. Of course you cannot prevent those pranks, people can do as they see fit. But it is my job to be cautious of this. I recognise people by face and we observe everyone, but I rely mostly on my hearing. I listen carefully if I hear anything out of the ordinary. I know which sounds are normal in the rooms. Checking for abnormal behaviour is also key: I once recognized someone by their walk; it was actually someone with a museum restraining order. We were quick to gently excort him outside.
All the museum guards in het Natuurhistorisch Museum Rotterdam work on voluntary basis. I work here because of my interest in all living creatures and I personally favour the structure it provides. I work once or twice a week and that is about enough. Most of the work consists of janitory tasks; fitting a light bulb, giving visitors directions, but I know a thing or two on what we have on display. My job involves staying in the background. Visitors do not really know what we do and that is fine. While working in the textile printing business I suffered from a depression; afterwards it was impossible to come back to the industry, it is barely alive as we speak. But being passionate about nature made it an easy choice to start my new job here. I sympathise with all creatures, from ticks to the giant cachalot, whose skeleton we have here. My favourite exhibition was the one on genetic mutations: we had hydrocephalic toads and embryos on formaldehyde. As a dog owner, I love the wolves we have here too. Nothing out of the ordinary happens here. It is usually pretty quiet, we do have a lot of primary schoool kids coming here as a day out. It is nice to see how they have their own concept of what they see; their imagination runs pretty wild. We did have a steal here once, a famous one. A few years ago, our rhinoceros’ head’s ivory nose was stolen, which hung in the hallway. The thieves had thrown the head from the staircase, making a huge dent in the hallway’s wooden floor. Never seen that horned nose again. We replaced it with a fake green one.
Nowadays, the profession of a museum guard is dated. A few years ago all museum guards were forced to do a security course and they became security guards as we know them now. The antiquated museum guards used to be folk from the council and disqualified bus drivers. As security guards we are qualified first aid workers, fire-fighters and provide an overall service. We learn to estimate people and evaluate risks on the job. An extreme situation occurred once when I was working in a different museum: an enraged guy came in and sliced up two painting using a Stanley knife. He had a fight with the municipality and took it out on the art here. My colleague was able to kick him to the ground: I was standing in the next room. The both of us handed him over to the police.
I absolutely adore all art and museums. My favourite kind of art is by The Hague School, painters like Breitner, Israels and Weisserbruch are simply amazing. We have some of their work here as well. Since I was a little boy I knew that I wanted to become a security guard. I visited Boijmans when I was five years old and my dream was to stand here one day. I have worked in different museums before starting here seven months ago. I have done all right; after almost fifte years, I am here!
I have had a guy here who asked me outright why I work here and how much I was paid. He claimed to be a big artist and was annoyed that het Stedelijk would not let him exhibit here. He even had been on TV. He still comes here every now and again for some small talk, but he is a bit off. We also had a fanatic Rietveld afficionado once who claimed that the chair we have in the Rietveld bedroom was not an original, but made by an apprentice. It was on my shift; he was on his knees, inspecting the chair from every angle, actually blocking the passageway. It is okay if people are passionate about something, but I will not tolerate any upheaval. I have had to deal with a lot of aggression at Schiphol, my former employer. Everything has to come off when bodychecking - belts, shoes. People are annoyed. Schiphol has about 400.000 cameras, they can even check if you pick your nose. Here in het Stedelijk, the atmosphere is much more cosy.
I was not into art at all before starting out here, but I knew that art needed to be safeguarded and well, that is what I do. Art to me used to be Rembrandt and van Gogh, but there is so much more. Guys like Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol of th Pop-art era: there is so much more modern art to be discovered. In an exhibition once, we had an artwork of which part of it was a banana peal lying on the floor. Nowadays, I get it. Most visitors did not and tried to pick it up. Of course, there is sometimes stuff that seems a bit pointless to me. But in general, I am amazed. Every day. Modern art is said to be originating from 1860s onwards and this is my favourite period. The earliest work of that period by Breitner, Courbet and van Gogh for instance, those pioneers are fascinating to me. Breitner was the first artist to paint by a photograph in stead of a set-up situation.
5.- 6. Raw Color + studio MKGK, Temporary Trees, 2012 7. Anne Holtrop, Temporary Museum (Lake), 2011
Elmgreen and Dragset, Prada Marfa, 2005