Louis Couperus Museum

Iris is a young artist. She works with installations and creates experiences in public spaces. The ‘Phantasmagoria’ of Iris contains images – real and as if in a dream – about Indonesian heritage and The Hague. Her grandfather grew up in the Dutch East Indies and in his legacy she found photographs and other documents she used for an intriguing installation projected on various transparent screens. The installation contains images from then and now, from past and present, from The Hague and from the Dutch East Indies, with matching music and commentary. The viewer can walk through it as if in a dream.

Couperus uses the term ‘phantasmagoria’ in a description of the sunsets on the Côte d’Azur that he experienced during the time he lived there (1900-1910):
“The morning on the Promenade is not yet interesting, so that in the morning I prefer to stay at home between my work and my books, the sunsets, by six o’clock, behind the coast of Antibes are every-day glories and phantasmagories, which I rarely miss. There is no one on the Promenade. It is Loneliness at dusk, and only my dreams walk, lightly with me. the first North Wind blows me frisch in the face, and the sea is dark and threatening and almost shines the sea of ​​Scheveningen. But behind Antibes are, above the threatening dark sea, the strange feërieen, the fata-morgana’s of magic lands, the mauve air lakes, in which the golden islands float and impale their splendid capes. Above the golden islands lashed flights of fenix-birds, with spread, amethyst-like wings … And there are only the fenix-birds, the golden miracle islands, the lilac celestials, and the dark Mediterranean waves, which rush with a blazing taut of prancing foam blankets. , Poseidonic Steeds … there are, in the falling night, only those all … there are people around me … only my light-hearted dreams … and it is so beautiful, so beautiful, so beautiful .. If it is only here in October, when it is never again, later, during the saison … “