INCORPORATIONS
Michael Stevenson, a talk
Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten, Amsterdam
13 November, 2025
Filmed by Kyu Lim Kim and Tomasz Skibicki - Edited by Tom Kemp and Tomasz Skibicki
On the occasion of the exhibition 'Incorporations' by Michael Stevenson and Tomasz Skibicki at GDL525, the artist initiative GDL525 (Filippo Tocchi and Rin Suemitsu) and Rijksakademie alum Tomasz Skibicki present a talk by artist Michael Stevenson at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten.
The talk departs from two works featured in the exhibition, 'Like a Fish Needs a Bicycle' and 'Building and Training a Demon Expulsion Team', which exemplify his ongoing investigation into the entanglement of belief, that spirit world, ritual and institutional authority, while opening a view onto the broader concerns and interests that have shaped his work and practice.
Stevenson’s materially dedicated research-driven and critically engaged practice explores the interplay of economics, technology, education, and faith. Over the past three decades, he has examined what might be called multiple industrial complexes – evangelical, psychiatric and military – considering how these systems are intertwined and operate to structure belief, authority, and behavior in contemporary life. The talk approaches these systems through the material and spatial forms they produce, considering how infrastructures – whether built, imagined, or mediated – embody architecture, space, and ideology, and how these forms hold and circulate meaning, belief, and authority within contemporary culture.
Michael Stevenson is an artist from Aotearoa, New Zealand, living in Berlin. Stevenson has exhibited internationally at institutions including 18th Lyon Biennial, MoMA New York, Tate Modern London, KW Institute for Contemporary Art Berlin, SculptureCenter New York, Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo Mexico City, and the New Zealand Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Since 2010, he has been Professor of Sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts Nuremberg.