MASEREEL

Our studio was once again a dynamic space this year, where artists could explore and reinvent materials, techniques, and ideas. Subtle gestures, bold choices, and unexpected collaborations were given room to develop and be tested against a critical framework.

A look back through five remarkable projects:

1. Clara Spilliaert – Trianal

As part of RHIZOMA, Clara Spilliaert created Trianal – a work on paper connected to her eponymous installation for the biennale – focusing on an everyday but seldom-discussed theme: visiting the toilet.

In the past, a mixture of forest leaves was used as both bedding and toilet paper – with soft oak leaves being the preferred choice – all ending up in the cesspit in direct, organic contact with nature. This stands in stark contrast to today’s industrial toilet paper, where the only reference to nature is found in embossed motifs of flora and fauna. From this tension, Spilliaert created a work on paper, exactly the size of one sheet of toilet paper, featuring a highly personal embossing.

Embossing on paper, 10 x 14 cm, edition of 20, 2025

2. Girls Like Us – Manifesto Pants

Following the publication of Love & Lightning: A Collection of Queer and Feminist Manifestos, the artist collective Girls Like Us created the Manifesto Pants – hand-printed, unisex jogging trousers featuring quotes from the publication.

The manifestos in Love & Lightning range from classic activist texts to poetic and associative approaches, breaking binary logic and transcending the boundaries of time, space, and discipline. The Manifesto Pants, screen-printed in five colors at MASEREEL, make these powerful texts literally wearable, bringing their message into everyday life.

Hand-printed jogging trousers in gray and white, sizes S to XXL, 2025

3. Vaast Colson – Framing and Reframing

During the winter of 2024-25, Vaast Colson stayed in the iconic artists’ residences at MASEREEL, which after more than fifty years are making way for a new pavilion. The nine abandoned shower curtains served as inspiration for his hybrid work Framing and Reframing (Gradually experiencing the consequence(s) of being in the world).

Each edition consists of a stretched shower curtain on aluminum, printed with two hand-made screen prints, shifting the curtain from a vertical to a horizontal, landscape-like orientation. The work is activated through performative interventions by the artist on the front, back, and underside, which are also documented. The sound work I’m just a hummin’ and a wailin’ is also part of the edition.

This edition was realized within the framework of RHIZOMA 2025.

Two-dimensional constellation, various materials (screen print on shower curtain, Polaroid, USB stick), 100 x 95 cm, 2025

4. Otobong Nkanga – Strains and Residues

As part of RHIZOMA, Otobong Nkanga spent several months in the MASEREEL studio, which she temporarily used as a presentation space during the biennale. Here she created Strains and Residues, a site-specific installation offering sculptural interpretations of the traces and processes she personally experienced in the studio. In doing so, she shifts the focus from finished products to raw materials, techniques, labor, and debris, highlighting the materiality and transformative potential of everyday materials.

For several graphic works, Nkanga combined digital and traditional printing techniques, including making a laser cut in lithostones. This project will continue in 2026.

5. Sawangwongse Yawnghwe – Rebel Queen

The works by Sawangwongse Yawnghwe, presented within the framework of the RHIZOMA biennale, explore power, identity, and gender within the history of Burma (Myanmar), revealing the complex roles of women who defy expectations as leaders, rebels, and warriors. For the presentation, Yawnghwe challenged our studio to print silk banners, which express the themes of transformation and fluid power both literally and visually.

Screen print on silk, 136.5 x 103.5 cm, 2025

These five projects represent only a small selection from an exceptional year. In 2025, a wide range of artistic practices, encounters, and trajectories unfolded, shaping and sustaining our programme. We extend our sincere thanks to all artists, partners, visitors, and collaborators for their engagement and trust, and we look ahead with anticipation to what 2026 will bring.