Name: Archipel XPO - An Assembly for Archipel Antwerp, 2025 - Bert Villa
Start: 2025-09-05T16:00:00+02:00
End: 2025-09-05T20:00:00+02:00
Location: Slachthuislaan 23, 2060, Antwerpen

Archipel XPO - An Assembly for Archipel Antwerp, 2025 - Bert Villa

Archipel XPO opens the new season with An Assembly for Archipel, Antwerp, an exhibition by artist-architect Bert Villa. His practice blends art, architecture, and collective engagement, shaped by experiences with Constructlab in Berlin and collective 019 in Ghent.
The show presents twelve photographs of outdoor installations alongside sketches for a future public artwork near Archipel. Central is the idea of Assembly—landscapes as layered constellations of memory, structure, and imagination.
Villa envisions the upcoming project around the semaphore, a historical signaling device, reimagined as a poetic figure in public space. For him, art is not “wallpaper,” but a catalyst for friction, curiosity, and transformation.
An Assembly for Archipel, Antwerp invites visitors to reflect, converse, and imagine new possibilities for public space.

Opening: Friday/vrijdag September 5, 2025 — 4 pm - 8 pm
7pm - 8pm: Participatory work table session #1 with Bert Villa
Discussion about the preliminary design for the small-scale art commission on Lobroekkade: “A new archetypal landscape sculpture for Archipel, Antwerp” Not a traditional artist talk, but an open conversation with Bert Villa at a sketch table. Based on the theme ‘a new archetypal landscape sculpture’, he explores how an element can enhance the legibility and layering of the public space around Archipel. This archetypal sculpture serves as a landmark and anchors the installation both scenically and socially. Bert engages in dialogue with residents, partners, and stakeholders about which archetype could ultimately occupy a place on the quay. While he actively sketches and explores, space is created for encounters with the place and its passers-by.

Saturday/zaterdag September 6, 2025 — 12pm - 4pm
Thursday/donderdag September 11, 2025 — 4 pm - 8 pm
Friday/vrijdag September 12, 2025 — 4 pm - 8 pm
Finnisage: Saturday/zaterdag September 13, 2025 — 11am - 8pm
1 pm - 2 pm: Participatory work table session #2 with Bert Villa
Moderated by jury chair and artist Jean Bernard Koeman, in the presence of the Alderman for Culture, Lien Van de Kelder.