Jan Adriaans

Jan Adriaans is a Dutch visual artist based in Rotterdam.Through the use of video, sound and performance Adriaans shows that the idea of a human as an independently operating entity is an illusion. By drawing parallels between humans and animals, the set of constraints humans are subjected become more apparent. The Human Self: a mechanism without free will, but with the capacity to form narratives that have a political force.

Adriaans’ often uses the camera to capture modes of behaviour within specific power relations, in an attempt to cut through to the overlap of social and neurological patterns and abstractions in the emergence of thought. Art can make these patterns tangible and detectible through its aesthetic representations.

Adriaans studied Posthumanism at Leiden University and holds a Master’s from the DAI (2015). He teaches in Utrecht at HKU.

Exhibited, screened, spoken at Seoul Museum of Art Storage, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Kunsthal Rotterdam, The Nunnery Gallery London, Rencontres Internationales Paris, Nederlands Fotomuseum Rotterdam, Kunstmuseum Bonn, Museum of Yugoslav History Belgrade, Darwin Museum Moscow, IMPAKT fesitval Utrecht

Learn more about Jan Adriaans’ 20 minute presentation Stay for Do The Right Thing! - DAI's 3 day performance lecture marathon, July 2015

Learn more about Jan Adriaans written MA thesis (DAI, 2015): 

Follow Jan Adriaans "Life after DAI" via these website