The Embassy of Inclusive Society

This year the Dutch Design Week includes The Embassy of Inclusive Society; a place where participation for all and inclusiveness in the world of design are the themes of discussion. The Embassy has taken the form of a hair dresser: any visitor and non-visitor can sit down and get their hair cut. This represents the inclusive theme; the hair dresser is a place where all kinds of people meet. Osepa’s work fits perfectly with this chosen theme, as it asks questions about inclusiveness in the barbershop

Sinta Ketu (sit still)

In this work Kevin Osepa explores the importance of the barbershop to black men and its relationship with homophobia. These barbershops usually function as a safe space in the face of racism. But they’re unwelcoming to black gay men. Osepa spent a few weeks working in his local barbershop to capture intimate moments between barber and customer when all that hyper-masculinity briefly vanishes.

New work

In 2019 Osepa won the ING Unseen Talent Public Award with this series. His prize was a commission to make an artwork for a new ING office. His work … is now on display in our new office Maple!

On The Inside, Amsterdam – 'Transit'

Van 7 april tot en met 9 augustus 2026

Transit reflecteert op de onderling afhankelijke relatie tussen klimaat, industrie en welvaart. In de tentoonstelling komen wetenschappelijk onderzoek door de Sustainable Industry Lab (SIL) en kunst samen.

Het biedt geen oplossingen. In plaats daarvan roept het de vragen op die gesteld moeten worden. Soms compliceren de kunstwerken de standpunten die in het onderzoek naar voren zijn gebracht; op andere momenten versterken ze die juist. Door hun eigen beeldtaal zaait de kunst twijfel en soms zelfs ongemak.

Transit, an initiative of the Sustainable Industry Lab (SIL), a think tank focused on future scenarios for industry


Over het kunstwerk

De ING Collectie gaf de video van Cristina Lucas The People That is Missing in bruikleen. De video is een poëtische voorstelling over de consequenties van klimaatverandering. Het is geschoten in voormalig Spitsbergen (nu Svalbard archipel), een plaats waar het effect van veranderend klimaat het meest duidelijk zichtbaar en confronterend is. Het gedicht, voorgelezen door een voice-over, is een compilatie van citaten van onder anderen Alexander von Humboldt en Bruno Latour.

Museum MORE (Gorssel, NL): Jan Worst

July 9th to October 29th 2023

Kunsthalle Göppingen (DE) : Arjan van Helmond - First Person Singular

Arjan van Helmond is interested in painting as a medium that helps us think about objects, places and representations of spaces of our daily lives. His art practice focusses on appropriating through painting the unspectacular and even banal aspects of daily life. Like the backdrop to a moment in someone’s life, this room full of chairs, boxes and personal possessions seems to have a story to tell.

However, that’s not necessarily what Arjan van Helmond had in mind with this work. Depicting the unspectacular and even clichéd aspects of our day-to-day existence with evocative, realistic detail, all Van Helmond really wants is to help us think about and analyse the things and places around us.

Museum MORE, Gorssel – 'Charley Toorop & Pyke Koch - All or Nothing'

From 21 June until 25 October 2026

Our colleagues at ING Cedar will have to wait a little longer. The Harvest hasn’t been on display in a while because it was on loan. It’s on show at the Stairway To...? exhibition at KAdE, Amersfoort until May 10th and will travel to Gorssel afterwards. At Museum MORE it’ll be on display during the Charley Toorop & Pyke Koch exhibition.

Pyke Koch and Charley Toorop are two of the most prominent artists of the Dutch Magical Realism movement. They also have a personal connection. After their initial meeting, they were friends for their entire lives and even had a short relationship in 1922 and between 1932-33. Some of Koch’s earlier work were influenced by Toorop.

Charley Toorop & Pyke Koch - All or Nothing

About the artwork
For more information about this artwork, see the Stairway To...? text above.

Museum MORE, Gorssel – 'Junkspace'

From 6 November 2026

Another loan to Museum MORE is Graffiti Box by Frans Clement for the exhibition Junkspace. It borrowed its name from Rem Koolhaas’s 2001 essay Junkspace. With this term he referred to modern modular buildings and soulless construction boxes of steel and glass. The exhibition shows art works that reflect on uniform, anonymous living space.

Next to the less than inspirational side of public space, the exhibition also displays how it can – seemingly contrarily – lead to creativity. The Graffiti Box is a good example of this.

About the artwork

If there was ever a painting by Frans Clement that demonstrates his philosophy of art to perfection, this might well be it.

With his work, Clement aims to show that we are responsible for our surroundings, from which it’s impossible to separate ourselves. So, should we see this painting of an electricity substation covered with graffiti as a warning? Or as encouragement?