Turin Horse; hydrotherapy, 2023
Silkscreen print, mounted in birch frame
27x21x3,5cm
€300,- (edition of 5)

The project Turin horse is an attempt to expose the hidden narratives of wellbeing, especially anxiety disorders, and is an ongoing project from 2020. It reflects on the triggers that cause our anxieties to kick in and alludes to the moment one of the most profound philosophers of our time, Friedrich Nietzsche, walked on a square in Turin and was overcome with distress at the sight of a worn-down horse being whipped to death.

Turin horse uses multiple personal and literary references where horses are the cause of our nightmares or are the precursors of ill fate, in order to give physical presence to the terrors that are otherwise hidden, abstract and intangible. Don’t we all live with invisible horses that frighten us? And how do we take care of our darkest companions, the four announcers of the apocalypse, the mares that haunt us at night, the ones that kick and trample us into shape?

Real-life horses, animals known to being very sensitive to our mood and feelings, depend on intimacy and an emotional relationship in order to be able to ride them. In a way, they are the living manifestations of our inner world. Hence, they are used for several kinds of therapy that invite us to reconcile with our fears and emotions. But in order to do so, they need to be cared for, too. How can we take learning from that while we try to overcome our deepest fears?

The image shows an injured horse being treated with hydrotherapy in an equine recovery centre in Belgium in 2020. In this facility, horses are cared for with love and patience to get them back to good health and strength, using water as a conductor of connectivity and healing care.

High luster pearl, 2023
Silkscreen print, mounted in birch frame
21x16x3,5cm
€300,- (edition of 5)

High luster pearl uses the trope of a pearl as a visual metaphor to reflect on illness and overcoming challenge. Oysters cover unwelcome material (nucleus) that might harm the inside of the shell with multiple layers of soft nacre (mother of pearl) to create a pearl. Under the right conditions, it manages to secrete more and tighter layers of nacre — resulting in higher luster and bigger and better quality pearls. It managed to transform hardship into beauty. But how does that work for us, people?

We keep our bodies healthy and safe with an immune system that battles hormonal imbalances and harmful bacteria and viruses, but we also depend highly on the circumstances we live in. Only when our bodies have the resilience to fight, the time to rest and the medical resources to guarantee a win can we overcome illness. And in some cases — such as, in the artist’s case, with HIV/AIDS or depression — a pearl-shaped pill will make us luster.

The project raises poignant questions about accessibility to medicine and care as a collective responsibility. It thinks critically about the socio-political discrepancies and the monetary interests of the pharmaceutical industry, where patients continue to wait for treatment and illness is something to capitalize on. Nonetheless, it is also meant as a visual metaphor of hope and of overcoming illness despite adversity and social stigma.

NB: Over the past two years, Dijkhuizen worked together with a pearl farm in Japan to grow pearls from his daily medication. These pills were injected as nuclei in living oysters. In January 2024, they harvested the result of: Emtricitabine/ Temoforvirdisorproxil, Dolutegravir-Natrium, Doravirine/Lamivudine/Tenofovirdiroproxil, Co-trimoxazol/Sulfamethoxazol/ Trimethoprim and Virtioxetine a.o. More information about this project will follow soon.

Good Fortune, 2023
Paper, pencil and vinyl sticker, with hooks on the back
100x120cm
€200,- (edition of 7)

Good Fortune is a visual reflection on Goethe’s infamous sculpture Agathe Tyche, better known as Stein des guten Glücks, which he installed in his back garden in Weimar, Germany, in 1777. Goethe, known for his carpe diem attitude, believed that life is a chain of random events without order, reason, purpose or linear direction. He advocated self-realisation and a harmonious coexistence with(in) an ever-changing world, rather than trying to control it. Good fortune, for that matter, was a matter of agency and chance — of ‘life is what you make of it’.

The sculpture serves as a visual metaphor for those ideas. It uses the stable cube as a symbol of virtue and a sphere for our restless desire for change — thus bringing together two opposites into a synergy that depends on each other and balances both. Goethe says: ‘It never occurs to fools that merit and good fortune are closely united.’ Without something to put the turns of Fate to rest, we would never notice when she moved in favour of us.

Here, the yellow circle and pencilled square have the same dimensions as Goethe’s sculpture, thus referring to similar ideas – while it specifically negotiates the relation between illness, medication and luck, by echoing the cautionary yellow stickers on medication packaging and the usage of square boxes in medical administration. We ought to feel lucky to get a diagnosis and have access to medication that helps us battle illness, but how lucky are we when those round pills offer only half a cure and our wellbeing is still in shambles? How can we rethink practices of care and turn illness away from the realm of ill fate, towards a place where it no longer defines us, labels us and determines our place in society?