Nieuw Dakota proudly presents a selection of entries from our Corona-Archives. The Corona-Archives is the first initiative in the Netherlands that Covid-19 has launched from an artistic point of view.

perspective. From 15 March onwards, artists, thinkers and writers will share their stories and express social isolation, care, anger, fear, despair. The entries show threatening undertones and how we conquer these with reason, humour, measures and our personal daily lives.

Corona connects us all: “His impertinence makes clear to us something we already knew but could not yet fully assess: on how many levels we are connected, everywhere, and the complexity of the world in which we live, its social, political, economic but also interpersonal and psychological cohesion.” (Paulo Giordano, In Times of Contamination, March 2020) The translocal connection of the world becomes visible in the standstill. This standstill creates a new domain. How will this new domain take shape and how will corona change our lives? We do not want to let go of this moment in which the individual and the collective, far away and near, are so sharply redefined.

New Dakota does this by monitoring society for a longer period of time, imagining it and still celebrating it. Like the pandemic, we are going through three phases:

1. CORONA-ARCHIVES Open Call / acute phase

Togetherness, the urge to help, starting initiatives to encourage each other are an almost instinct driven reaction. This results in pure, direct and from the heart. We want to show this, especially now, because it fits in with what we almost all feel, and can give comfort and meaning in it.

2. PASSAGE / aftercare (archiving and presenting in Nieuw Dakota)

Togetherness, the urge to help, starting initiatives to encourage each other are an almost instinct driven reaction. In an acute phase of shocking events there is logically not much room for reflection, mourning and an overview of what awaits us. Aftercare calls for a continuation of the solidarity that seemed so easy in the acute phase. It calls for longer-term support (moral, social, psychological and financial) and for making the feelings visible. From the beginning of July, New Dakota opens its doors with (rite de) PASSAGE, a growing presentation of entries.

3. HEALING WOUNDS (closing exhibition early 2021)

What next? How is society changing? In a positive sense? How do we heal the wounds? Do we shut ourselves off and withdraw? Do we acknowledge the inescapable connection as a strength and a value.