The Life of Things: Where Art Meets the Everyday Object at the Voorlinden Museum
From January 25th to November 2nd, 2025, the Voorlinden Museum in Wassenaar, The Netherlands, presents “The Life of Things”, a major group exhibition featuring sculptures, installations, still lifes, and readymades that explore our relationship with everyday objects. Organized by the museum itself, the exhibition invites visitors to reflect on the material world that surrounds us — how we create, accumulate, value, and discard things, and how these same objects, in the hands of artists, become storytellers, systems, and emotional truths.
LEFT: Hans-Peter Feldmann (1941-2023), Horizon, 2014, Right - Ibrahim Mahana (1987), Famished Road, 2023
Collection Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Photo: Antoine van Kaam; RIGHT: Ibahim Mahama (1987), Famished Road, 2023, Collection Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Photo: Antoine van Kaam
 Sun Yitian (1991), Gun without bullets, 2022, Collection Museum Voorlinden
What Do Objects Say About Us?
“The Life of Things” begins with a simple yet disarming premise: objects are not passive. Every item around us carries a narrative — whether it’s a cobbler’s box, a school chair, or a forgotten book. The exhibition challenges visitors to pay attention to what these things reveal about our behaviors, values, and emotional landscapes. It opens with the monumental “Famished Road” (2023) by Ibrahim Mahama, composed of 2,000 reclaimed cobbler’s boxes, immediately setting a tone of poetic critique. Created especially for Voorlinden, the work physically blocks the passage, confronting viewers with material traces of labor, migration, and resistance. This and other pieces in the show reveal the quiet — yet persistent — presence of things in our personal and collective lives.
LEFT: Left, Michael Craig-Martin (1941), Space I, 2016. Right, Wouter Paijmans (1991), Stack of Flowers, 2018, Collective Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Photo: Antoine van Kaam; RIGHT: From left to right: Anouk Kruithof (1981), Enclosed content chatting away in the colour invisibility, 2009
Ai Weiwi (1957), Grapes, 2017
Ornaghi & Prestinari (1986 - 1984), Teso, 2023, Sun Yitian (1991), Gun without bullets, 2022, Collection Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Photo: Antoine van Kaam
A Global Dialogue Through Materials
With artists from different geographies and generations, “The Life of Things” establishes a truly global dialogue. From Chinese conceptual artist Ai Weiwei to Belgian multidisciplinary creator Hans Op de Beeck, from the compositions of Giorgio Morandi to the ironic precision of Claes Oldenburg, the exhibition offers a panorama of how diverse cultures and eras engage with materiality. The minimalist and emotional works of Joseph Cornell echo the digital vocabulary of Michael Craig-Martin, while the conceptual transformations of He Xiangyu contrast with the delicacy of the Italian duo Ornaghi & Prestinari. Whether through found objects, technological reinterpretations, or traditional media, each artist explores how we connect to the physical world and how we assign — or dismantle — meaning through form.
 Oliver Beer (1985), Devils, 2027. Collection Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar. Photo: Antoine van Kaam
Objects as Memory and Resistance
More than aesthetic, many works in the exhibition deal with the political and emotional weight of everyday materials. Dutch artist Anouk Kruithof’s installation, composed of 3,500 books from the former East Germany, forms a pixelated landscape that reflects on the disappearance of physical knowledge in the face of digital advancement. The objects here are not merely remnants — they are agents of resistance, memory, and transformation. The exhibition does not evoke nostalgia, but rather critique. It asks how objects contribute to the construction of identity and how we, in turn, shape the world by deciding what to preserve, what to discard, and what to ignore. These works remind us that material culture is not static — it is alive and evolves with us.
 Anouk Kruithof (1981), Enclosed content chatting away in the colour invisibility, 2009, Collection Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Photo: Antoine van Kaam
Giving Voice to the Silent
The exhibition concludes with a poetic and unexpected gesture: British artist Oliver Beer gives literal voice to historical objects through acoustic resonance. His installation transforms vases, ceramics, and household items into instruments of memory, inviting visitors to listen to the sound of time stored within them. It is a powerful way to end a journey that begins with boxes and ends with echoes — a reminder that the things surrounding us are never truly silent. The exhibition is accompanied by a richly illustrated catalogue, featuring texts by curator Barbara Bos, philosopher Emanuele Coccia, and an interview with Ibrahim Mahama.
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