Eye(s) Open - New Perspectives on Colonial Film Heritage, Eye Filmmuseum

Eye(s) Open: New Perspectives on Colonial Film Heritage

For Eye(s) Open, Diogo Passarinho Studio designed the spatial framework for eleven artists' responses to Eye Filmmuseum's archive of roughly 2,000 colonial-era films from Indonesia and Suriname. The exhibition brings together ten newly commissioned works,  film installations, multi-channel pieces, an AI-based reconstruction, each engaging critically with material shot from the perspective of the occupying power.

The scenography was conceived to hold this range of formats and tones within a single, legible sequence: room-scale film installations, quieter essayistic works, and archival material sit in dialogue rather than competition, with the design mediating between the historical weight of the source footage and the contemporary, often confrontational, artistic responses built on top of it.

In line with the studio's broader interest in how spatial design shapes emotional and bodily experience, the layout paces the visitor's movement through difficult material, allowing each work the isolation it needs while keeping the collection's shared colonial history legible as a throughline across the show.

2026 Eye Filmmuseum, NL

Design: Diogo Passarinho Studio

Team: Diogo Passarinho and Gonçalo Reynolds

The exhibition was curated by Hicham Khalidi, in close collaboration with Judith Öfner.

Artists: Paula Albuquerque (Portugal/Netherlands), Timoteus Anggawan Kusno(Indonesia), Esther Figueroa (Jamaica), Sabine Groenewegen (Netherlands), Jongsma + O'Neill (Eline Jongsma and Kel O'Neill) (Netherlands/United States), Miranda Pennell (United Kingdom), Jameisha Prescod (United Kingdom), Afrian Purnama (Indonesia), Riar Rizaldi (Indonesia) and Mahardika Yudha (Indonesia).

Photography: Studio Hans Wilschut

3 April — 6 September 2026