What the flag?!
a growing collection of flags my by artists
what the flag?! is a project initiated in 2016 by Wouter Huis
2023 Luxembourg
In the context of the European Design Festival, which will take place in Luxembourg in 2023, Cercle Cité in collaboration with Greylight Projects (Heerlen, NL) proposes an off-site exhibition What the Flag?! in Luxembourg.
The flags, works by invited Luxembourgish artists and designers, will be mixed with existing artists’ flags, which are part of the archive of the What the Flag?! project which has taken place in the city of Heerlen and art organizations in the Euregion (DE, BE, NL) since 2021. The artists and designers are invited to respond from their own work and vision of the medium “flag” within the context of the location in which they are shown. They are asked to question the flag not only formally but also conceptually, transposing and reevaluating their practice onto this specified medium and the public space.
The flags will be placed between the central locations of the European Design Festival 2023 in the city of Luxembourg (Casino Luxembourg – Forum d’art contemporain, Rotondes, Cercle Cité, Schluechthaus, LUCA) forming a route that the public can follow with the help of a map, available at the Ratskeller exhibition space starting May 15.
The What the Flag?! project initiates an artistic and creative exchange beyond borders and its Luxembourg edition will see the project transposing itself onto a new and exciting city in the context of a European festival.
The opening of the exhibition will take place on May 15 at 5.30 p.m., in the main entrance of the Cercle Cité (Place d’Armes).
Participating artists: Stina Fisch, Marco Godinho, Julien Hübsch, Reza Kianpour, Vera Kox, Lagerkultur, Miriam Rosner, Sarah Schleich
Curated by: Wouter Huis & Anastasia Chaguidouline
link: www.cerclecite.lu
link: www.greylightprojects.org

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Feeling closer to all directions, 2023 Marco Godinho
Location: Place de Metz At the crossroads of the main axis of the city center of Luxembourg, where cars, pedestrians and public transport meet, Marco Godinho installs four flags. Each flag is represented by a coloured gradation that corresponds to a natural element (water, fire, wood and metal) and to a specific direction (north, south,…
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Untitled (blue flags), 2023 Julien Hübsch
Location: Cercle Cité | Place d’Armes In 2022, Julien Hübsch worked on a large-scale installation on the Metzeschmelz industrial site in Esch-Sur-Alzette. This vast industrial landscape was once the reason for families from Portugal, Italy and Ex-Yugoslavia to come to Luxembourg to start a new life. The artist digitally fragmented pictures of his onsite installation…
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NEVER EVER, 2023 Reza Kianpour
Location: Casino Luxembourg | 41, rue Notre-Dame Reza Kianpour’s project plays with the idea of attachment and our relationship: to a nationality, to an identity, to a culture, to a community, to a belief… In the manner of a performance, he stages his image in real size to give the illusion of clinging relentlessly to…
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Fest und klar und heiter, 2023 Stina Fisch
Location: Place des Martyrs “The worker must have bread, but she must have roses, too.” Rose Schneidermann (1911) Inspired by the contrast between the Place des Martyrs that is marked by the old ARBED building reminiscent of Luxembourg’s industrial past, and the traditional rose garden “Rousegäertchen” situated opposite the building, Stina Fisch’s flags illustrate the…
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Brothers and sisters, 2023, Miriam Rosner
Location: Place de Paris “To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul.” Simone Weil (1942) Flags are a nation’s “brand mark” and as such, in history as well as in current times, they have been and can be misused or become subject of positive or negative reinterpretation. They…
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Troop flag, 2023, Sarah Schleich
Location: LUCA – Luxembourg Center for Architecture | 1, rue de la Tour Jacob “Men don’t cry. But they should …” Fascinated by the author Jack Urwin and his book BOYS DON’T CRY where identity and masculinity are thematised, this subject served as the inspiration for Sarah Schleich’s latest series of works. Why are people…
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On higher ground, levitating, 2023 Vera Kox
Location: Rotondes | 3, place des Rotondes Flags and banners often mark territorial claims and national boundaries. Vera Kox’s flags, on the other hand, depict an imaginary landscape of organic matter woven into industrially patterned ceramic surfaces from the artist’s sculptural repertoire. Lichens, algae, mosses, and fungi are among the first species to grow on…
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Safe Space Federation, 2023 Lagerkultur
Locations:LUCA – Luxembourg Center for Architecture | 1, rue de la Tour JacobCorner avenue de la Liberté / Avenue de la GareSchluechthaus | Porte de Hollerich Safe Space Federation is a mentally driven campaign inviting individuals to build moments of peaceful excitement. It consists of a series of three installations, designed as abstractly defined spaces,…