FMP Portfolio review Ruben Lundgren

I had a portfolio review with Ruben Lundgren. He speaks Dutch and that gave a different experience that the English ones I had before. He is an artist, photojournalist and curator.

Before the talk I of course looked at his website. I saw that he does a lot in China and that he is exactly 2 meters long. That he made a suit with the meters on there, made it into a project. I love the humour and the graphic design. The book being also 2 meters.

I told him my story in Dutch that was different because most of the time I have to do it in English and it feels different it's harder to explain the real feelings my English vocabulary isn't as large as my Dutch.

Telling Ruben about my work about the way governments try to change the weather and mentioned Beijing and the Olympic games I learnt that he is actually living in China in Beijing. I asked him if he is experiencing the changing of the weather if he was there and what people did think of it. He told me that it happens regulairy, the parades every five years are one of those occasions. That for the Olympics it was about national pride; everything had to be managed. And if people thought it to be wrong nobody expresses it and there is no place to do so. He wasn't aware of the fact that it happend also on other places in the world.

There are stories about empty shells being found, used to shoot the Silver Iodide in the air but he never saw one himself. It kept a bit of feeling like a fairytale although he also knew it actually happened. To my question if he thought the Earth's surface was getting darker from the precipitation, the answer was that he hadn't noticed.

His feedback on my work: The work appeals to the imagination. The mix of the visuals, the technical part and the story. He was already making an exhibition with it in his head in which the various elements were brought together. My material was good, well thought out too. Yet there is also room in the project for experimentation and "excursions" such as the vases which he thought to be amazing. I look at an age-old subject, the clouds, from a contemporary, modern perspective.

He told me that he is going to keep my work in his mind to maybe late to work together in exhibition because he also works together with Dutch artist.

---

Resource

• LUNDGREN, Ruben. Website. Available at: https://www.rubenlundgren.com/about [accessed on: 10 October 2020]