Art Antwerp 2024

Fiona Lutjenhuis

The work of Fiona Lutjenhuis (Zevenaar, NL, 1991) revolves around depicting and reinterpreting the religious ideologies she grew up with. During her childhood, she lived with her family in a village in North Brabant, where her parents joined a sect based on a mixture of theosophical ideas, esoteric cosmologies, stories about extraterrestrial life and the existence of supernatural life forms. Drawing on personal memories and archival material, she explores and transforms the ideological legacy of her childhood. Rather than a literal reconstruction, her work offers a poetic retelling: an attempt to make the unknown tangible, without the intention of judgement. Fascinated by religious art, Lutjenhuis builds and paints folding screens as carriers of stories: mobile, vision-like paintings that function both sculpturally and narratively. She also bakes bread in various shapes, a ritual that makes her feel secure but also has religious connotations: bread is the symbol of life, sacrifice and providence. She also makes dolls that represent the entities that regularly appeared in the sect, whose visual language is borrowed from Eastern cultures. Other recurring elements in her presentations, which often resemble installations, are murals and wind chimes. The stories Lutjenhuis tells are full of references that touch the viewer on different levels. She also uses humour in her work, a component that has helped her to cope with her demagogic upbringing. Lutjenhuis uses her unusual childhood to view contemporary discourse through a theosophical lens. In recent years, she has immersed herself in the archives of the sect she grew up with, as well as in the broader religious movements that have been blended or distorted in that group's ideology. These are far removed from the Western world, which in its pursuit of rationality has distanced itself from nature. The individual reigns supreme: humans have placed themselves above all else, with the inevitable consequence of abusing the life around us. Lutjenhuis makes a plea for opening up our psyche, so that we can allow the magical elements of nature to enter and become part of our human actions. This is by no means in the context of proselytising: it is simply a matter of thinking in a deeper, more empathetic layer of consciousness. Lutjenhuis's starting position is unique: the artist possesses a rare knowledge and lived experience of spiritual and supernatural thinking, framed by a self-taught, balanced, autonomous view of the world around her. Art is a gateway to another reality for her, offering her joy and new perspectives. She wants to offer this to her audience as well. With her art, Lutjenhuis takes the viewer into a world that makes the invisible visible. Fiona Lutjenhuis lives and works in Amsterdam. She studied at ArtEZ University of the Arts, Arnhem (2010-2014) and was a resident at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam from 2022 to 2024. In 2024, she was nominated for the Scheffer Art Prize, in 2025 for the Prix de Rome and she won the NN Art Award in 2026. She has exhibited in various Biennales, museums and project spaces, such as Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Gwangjung Biennale, 1646, H3H Biennale, Drawing Centre Diepenheim, Noordbrabants Museum and Kunsthal Rotterdam.