Suitcase Illuminated #6 Tunnel Effect

Harald Thys & Jos de Gruyter

This first solo exhibition in Italy of Belgian artists Jos De Gruyter and Harald Thys takes place in Kaleidoscope HQ’s project space in Milan.

26/05 - 30/07/2009

@ Kaleidoscope Headquarters Milan

It is the first in a series of events and presentations entitled ‘tunnel effect’ curated by Katia Anguelova, Alessandra Poggianti and Andrea Wiarda and also initiates the activities of the Dipartimento Curatoriale Mobile.


Tunnel Effect” is the first instance of the activities of the Dipartimento Curatoriale Mobile. The project is articulated through a programme of video presentations in various locations and moments in the city of Milan, Italy. Tunnel Effect is a natural manifestation supposed by quantum physics in which a particle in movement succeeds in moving through a barrier, creating interactive flows with other particles. The effect occurs equally when the given particle has a lower quantity of energy than the potential barier. It is a phenomenon that has been largely ignored in classical mechanics. Each occasion in Tunnel Effect will be presented by DCM in a different location in town, representing a crossing and a movement as a means of knowledge, as a perceptive and creative act, a reading and writing of the urban territory as well as a format to discuss artistic practices. The spaces involved are viewed as particles of a manifestation capable of putting forward their own energies to move through and annul the symbolic ànd physical barriers of urban space.

Tunnel Effect is the 6th edition of Suitcase Illuminated, a project initiated by Katia Anguelova and Alessandra Poggianti that proposes itself as a video node and container for different video researches and compilations. Suitcase Illuminated hosts projects of its own and from third parties. It proposes a global itinerary to outline an immaterial and nomadic geography. Suitcase Illuminated assumes video compilations as a node that opens further perspectives through the occupations of the expository space that generates multiple relations and connections. After the 5th edition “On Parallel Economy” presented at Mac/Val in Paris and P74 Center and Gallery in Ljubljana, Suitcase Illuminated #6 takes the format of a spatio-temporal video programme in the city of Milan throughout 2009-10.
The activities of the Dipartimento Curatoriale Mobile are realised in collaboration with Associazione FARE, set up in 2008 with the objective to spread culture as a means of social integration and a territorial reformulation. FARE’s main focus is on networking and the creation of liaisons between the operators of the contemporary.

*DCM has continued as Kunstverein Milano since 2010


Share on Facebook / Twitter

During the exhibition De Gruyter and Thys will be showing their latest series of photographs (Untitled N°1-9), Three large video projections The Frigate (2008), Der Schlamm von Branst (2008) and Ten Weyngaert(2007) as well as a selection of previous video works. The artists have produced an edition of 20 sculptures especially for the occasion.
The meticulous and slightly absurd work of De Gruyter and Thys is characterised by loaded atmospheres and claustrophobic spaces populated by strange figures, impersonated by non-professional actors, captured in no apparent relation with the ‘real world’. With dialogue reduced to a minimum, sound and often surreal gestures drive the attention to what is left of a narrative structure. The singular and theatrical parallel world they create is however paradoxically not that much different from the one we live in. The films transmit apparently trivial situations in a way reminiscent of experimental dramaturgy and performance in which black humour becomes the key to extend our inquiry and reflection into behavioural mechanisms and routines in contemporary society.

On the occasion of the opening the three latest films of the artists’ duo will be screened, followed by a conversation between the artists, Francesco Garutti (architect and independent curator), the curators and the audience.


Jos De Gruyter & Harald Thys (De Gruyter 1965, Geel, B / Thys 1966, Wilrijk, B) live and work in Brussels, Belgium and collaborate since the second half of the 1980s. Major exhibitions include: at Dependance, Brussels (2009); Manifesta7, Trento; 5th Berlin Biennial (2008); Gallery Artspeak, Vancouver; MuHKA, Antwerp; De Appel, Amsterdam; Galerie Carlier/Gebauer, Berlin (2007); Gallery Isabella Bortolozzi, Berlin (2006); Bozar, Brussels; SMP, Marseille (2005).