Awesome secrets at Council House Palace, while you still can | Tilburg eo

He is pleasantly busy with the Pop Up Paleis exhibition, organized by three artists. One of them, Chris Oomes, is pictured with a selection of moody black and white photos he has taken of Tilburg in recent years.

Co-organizer Riëtte Sommerdijk shows some great portraits she made with a sewing machine. The most impressive is a collection of works in the Willem II room, with the theme of “secrets”. Under the banner of Kunstkameraden, they were made by young people who often came to the Netherlands from conflict zones. The project focuses on children and young people from diverse (cultural) backgrounds in vulnerable situations.

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Councilor Esmah Lahlah performs the opening of their exhibition. She stresses how good it is that young people who have not been able to develop in their home country can do so in the Netherlands. This is certainly the case for Lidia (19), originally from Eritrea. If she passes HAVO this year, she wants to continue to VWO to study psychology. She has produced two paintings in which she plays with the idea of ​​what it means to be a woman. The masks and a flower refer to vulnerability and the need not to expose oneself.

“What particularly touches me are the stories behind the works,” says Lahlah. “The experiences they went through make me sad. What also touches me, but positively, is that they can express this through art. They learn that from artists. It’s great that Kunstcomrades focuses on these young people.

“Started in Breda, we’ve been doing this for ten years now,” says Lisette Fleur, initiator at the time. As of 2018, Tilburg is the only city to have a studio where former refugees are connected with artists. “We are mainly concerned with a good match, like between Lidia and Ema Vaneková. They are peers. They shared their worlds with each other. The result is not paramount, but the process and the contacts.