Gender Talk: Unspoken / Outspoken
GENDER EMANCIPATION | 2016
Installation & ongoing series
Discipline: Monumental total installation / Interactive installation
Context: Part of the large-scale factory installation 'Identity Rooms, Walking into my Artwork, scale 1/1' (2015-2019)
Methodology: Research-based practice / Socially engaged art (Social practice)
Concept & Vision
Gender Talk: Unspoken / Outspoken is a museum-grade, monumental total installation functioning as an open space designed to radically open up the urgent public debate surrounding broader gender issues. The work was created exactly 10 years ago, in 2016, as a specific 'Gender Room total installation' within the large-scale factory installation 'Identity Rooms, Walking into my Artwork, scale 1/1' (2015-2019), out of the profound conviction that every individual has the right to their own identity and their own safe space.
In the socio-cultural climate of the time, the word ‘Gender’ was by no means a mainstream term; it was rarely used in popular media, and a deep societal discomfort and an enforced silence surrounded the entire issue (Unspoken). The project stood as a groundbreaking, innovative, and avant-garde intervention that resolutely broke open prevailing taboos: from the necessity of women's emancipation and the fight against partner violence (against both women and men), to homofobia, child abuse, and violence targeting trans individuals and all genders within the LGBTQIA+ community.
To bring these heavy voices forcefully to the fore (Outspoken), the themes were deliberately approached with a playful angle and a sharp, witty twist. Not a political pamphlet, but the power of a light-hearted counter-play. This was a deliberate, barrier-breaking strategy: by welcoming the audience in an accessible, almost cheerful manner, the threshold surrounding this unfamiliar and uncomfortable topic was dismantled.
Visitors became far more receptive and open to engaging in genuine dialogue. From this welcoming opening, the experience could organically shift towards the serious and raw reality of the matter. Rooted in a long-term, research-based practice, this socially engaged work shatters the silence surrounding abuse and physical or psychological violence across all relationships, orientations, and genders. It opens up a necessary and activist discourse on safety, power structures, and equal representation.
Spatial Design & Materiality
The physical setup was concretely constructed as a 'Room', a tangible space within the Identity Rooms. It forms a flexible, museum-grade capsule conceived not to be static, but to grow organically according to the specific space in which it stands and the ongoing evolution in time surrounding these issues. Whereas it was originally created to break through an urgent silence, the work reacts today to shifts in societal acceptance and the current debate. It is an environment where the visitor can actually step inside, absorb the entirety of the space, and directly engage in confrontation and active dialogue with other visitors. It is only when the playful element recedes that the work organically transitions into the raw reality.
The work's materiality plays a vital, articulate role. The tactile dimension of the materials used—the raw structures and the spatial constructions—possesses its own active agency. Rather than standing as merely decorative elements within the space, these components claim their own physical presence and guide the sensory and emotional journey of the visitor.
Interaction & Visceral impact
The installation is built on the fundamental premise that the artistic quality and the visual power of an artwork must be at least equal to—if not many times greater than—the heavy thematic weight underneath. In socially engaged art, it is an absolute rule that the subject matter must never be used as artwashing. Only through an uncompromising mastery of visual materials and a spatial practice does the gravity of the cargo remain intact, allowing the autonomous visual language to retain its eloquent power. The work refuses to default into a pure political pamphlet or a didactic gesture; an important social issue is not weaponised here as a superficial lampoon filled with one-liners.
The arrangement within the Identity Rooms functions as an interactive installation that is only fully completed by the physical presence, movement, and action of the visitor. Through the synthesis of tactile materials, raw textual fragments, and physical barriers, an environment is generated that leaves a profound, visceral impact; a deep, instinctive gut feeling that registers long before the intellect can fully analyse the heavy weight of the themes. The artwork achieves a necessary, powerful disruption of our societal gaze. The installation thus functions as a deeply felt, monumental artwork that compels the spectator into a substantial and respectful dialogue.
©2016-2026 Hilde NIJS. All rights reserved.
Variable Identity Rooms, Walking into my Artwork / Scale 1/1 / 2015
The human psyche & the architecture of identity
Installation & ongoing series
Discipline: Monumental total installation / Modular architectural sculpture
Context : A location-responsive, autonomous spatial work that can be presented independently of the original place of creation.
Methodology: Spatial practice / Conceptual scenography / Philosophical reflection
Context
Variable Identity Rooms is a monumental museum installation that functions as a walkable artwork. This large-scale architectural structure departs from the philosophical premise that our identity develops continuously depending on the spaces in which we live and the people we encounter. In line with this vision, the work examines the existential question of how the human psyche relates to the rooms that surround us. The viewer literally walks inside the artwork. The project deconstructs the human ego by offering a navigable environment in which the visitor, surrounded by autonomous visual art, reflects on the fluid structures of their own identity, concepts & Vision.
Spatial Design & Materiality
The core of the spatial design lies in a compelling visual duality. Each room is conceived in such a way that the visitor is confronted with a stark dichotomy. On one side, the space presents itself as perfect, aesthetic, and harmoniously ordered. The opposite side, by contrast, is left completely in disorder and chaos. Consequently, universally recognisable rooms—such as the bedroom, the library room, and the dining room—become the physical carriers of a psychological tension: the human urge for order, harmony, and creation versus the inevitable tendency towards decay and disintegration. The total installation consists of a flexible configuration of these conceptual spaces, including the smallest room, music room, black room, Curiosity Room, Freud's room, and the nursery. Because each room is designed as a standalone entity, the spaces possess absolute museum autonomy; they can be transported independently and reconstructed in varying arrangements across different art contexts.
The physical structures of the rooms are not intended as a decorative stage set. They claim their own tangible presence, focusing on the pure texture of the walls and objects, and guiding the sensory route of the visitor. These architectural rooms function as an artwork that in turn houses and exhibits other autonomous artworks by the artist. An essential component of the work is the ongoing investigation into the impact of time. Since the initial construction, the rooms have deliberately been left completely untouched; no cleaning or human correction takes place. Through this conceptual choice, the test of time is given free rein. The descending dust and the natural, atmospheric decay thus become active, transforming elements that visibly reflect the history of the rooms upon the materials themselves.
Interaction & Visual/Visceral Impact
The Variable Identity Rooms speak through an autonomous, abstract visual language that stems from an uncompromising mastery over space and visual composition. The installation is only fully completed by the physical presence and movement of the viewer walking through the artwork. Wandering through these contrasting spaces forces the visitor into a moment of pure aesthetic observation, universal introspection, and stillness.
©2015-2026 Hilde NIJS. All Rights Reserved.
Hilde NIJS - Variable Identity Rooms, Walking into my Artwork!
video below
©2015-2026 Hilde NIJS. All Rights Reserved.