Emma Verhoeven

artistic research - audiovisual - conceptual - design - installation - video

I am a Rotterdam based media artist working with installation, video, and workshops. My creative practice investigates the manipulative nature of digital media and the conflicting desires it creates in us. I am deeply fascinated by the motivations behind people's goals and dreams – especially when these appear as part of larger trends fueled by online media. I find it important to question the ways our commerce-driven media landscape shows, shapes and shifts the definitions of a meaningful, successful life. Through playful research methods, I delve into this landscape, deconstruct and re-assemble its narratives, and create entertaining multimedia works that invite critical reflection.

  • Portfolio
  • Activities
  • Contact

    • The Self Design Academy

    Exhibition / presentation

    • 18-09-2020 t/m 22-11-2020
    • In collaboration with: The Image Society, VSB Fund
    • Location: MU Hybrid Arthouse, Eindhoven
    • The installation Escape Here Now gives an absurd overview of the confusing economy of the Self, in the form of an immersive, escape room-like experience that sends its visitors on a quest for meaning and self-discovery. As a virtual alternative, a 2D point and click game can be played on the online exhibition website.
    • https://www.theselfdesignacademy.nl/en/work/emmaverhoeven/

    E ROB –

    Task

    • 01-09-2019 t/m 15-03-2020
    • In collaboration with: Extra Practice; What If Lab, Embassy of Safety, Dutch Design Foundation; Municipality of Haarlem, National Hotline Internet Scams
    • Location: Dutch Design Week, Eindhoven
    • Every year, thousands of people become victims to online shopping fraud, despite warning campaigns. Why is it that even when we aware of the danger, we can still be deceived? Could there be a deeper drive, overruling our rational judgment, that we need to come to terms with? To investigate this, we set up E-ROB, the Experimental Rehab for Online Buyers. At DDW we tested, diagnosed and treated visitors to both rE-search and rE-boot their online shoppin
    • https://www.worlddesignembassies.com/project/what-if-lab-live-safety-matters/

    The Data Self

    Other

    • 25-10-2018 t/m 25-10-2018
    • In collaboration with: IMPAKT festival, KABK
    • Location: The House, Utrecht
    • Screening of 'Nero' at The Data Self: In a world shaped by signals and codes, technology often becomes the lens through which identity and selfhood are transformed. The films in this program tell the human and inhuman stories across simulations and real environments in order to question the politics of representation and imagination.
    • https://impakt.nl/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/IMPAKT_FB_2018.pdf

    Once Upon A Time in Desktoppywood

    Workshop

    • 07-12-2020 t/m 09-12-2020
    • In collaboration with: with Benjamin Earl, for The Critical Inquiry Lab
    • Location: Design Academy Eindhoven, Eindhoven
    • A 3-day workshop created for the MA Critical Inquiry Lab at the Design Academy Eindhoven in which we taught theory about and tools for desktop filmmaking, using mainstream popular media as our material for critical video essays.
    • https://desktoppywood.bnjmnearl.eu

    Digital Place makers

    Workshop

    • 04-09-2021 t/m 17-10-2021
    • In collaboration with: Dr. Amanda Paz Alencar, Translocal Lives, Erasmus University Rotterdam
    • Location: EUR, Rotterdam
    • As part of the Translocal Lives research project that investigates the intersection between refugee settlement, place-making, and digital technologies. I taught 15 participants with a refugee background to translate their stories about belonging into 3-5 minute short films, shot on smartphones. Results will be screened in December, at an event where local governance actors in the migration field will be present to exchange perspectives. Currently finishing a short documentary about the process!
    • https://www.translocallives.com/research

    Acknowledgments

      Scholarship