Antwerp Art Weekend 2025

Antwerp Art Weekend is set to be legendary, and M HKA will be the beating heart of the action.
As a central location, we’re hosting the explosive kick-off party on Thursday night and presenting a packed programme of exhibitions, performances, and live events.

Antwerp Art Weekend also marks the final weekend of the exhibition Hugo Roelandt – The End Is a New Beginning. Don’t miss this last chance to experience the exhibition.

Sharpen your senses, keep an eye on this page for updates, and experience the unmissable celebration weekend of contemporary art. Celebrate, discover, and experiment with us.

Programme

Ongoing

*Discover all our current exhibitions

EXHIBITION — (Closing Weekend) Hugo Roelandt — The End is a New Beginning
COLLECTION —  Panamarenko — A Journey to the Stars
COLLECTION — The Situation is Fluid
ARCHIVE — The King Kong: Between Cinephilia and Activism
INBOX — Sean Peleman — Are You Still Watching?
TOP FLOOR Antwerp Art Graduation Prize 2024

Thursday 29.05.2025

*ANIMATED FILM – Stories in Motion, Inspired by Panamarenko
12:00-21:00, M HKA, ground floor

KASKA DKO, in collaboration with M HKA, presents a series of Panamarenko-inspired animated films created by children, youth, and adults from the Audiovisual, Film and Video Art, and Digital Visual Arts programs. Using self-designed vehicles, engaging storylines, and dynamic storyboards, they bring their own adventures to life.

*AUTOMATIC AUDIO TOUR  – An English-language audio tour inspired by the work of Hugo Roelandt
12:00-21:00, M HKA, 2^nd floor: Hugo Roelandt

In English, bring your own earphones.

By Bernadette Zdrazil, Tibo Vergote, Noura Marien and Ethan Cannaert, students of the Educational Master’s programme at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp

An experimental audio tour that guides the visitor during their visit to the Hugo Roelandt exhibition. We provide you with a series of simple instructions to follow in the exhibition: “If you do exactly what we say, then you create the piece yourself.”

In this audio tour, the audience is challenged to move through the exhibition as a performer. Visitors are given the opportunity to actively participate and make choices within the exhibition.

*FILM – From Visitor to Performer: Hugo Roelandt and the Automatic Audio Tour
12:00-21:00, M HKA, 1st floor (Salon)
In English

This film takes the exhibition Hugo Roelandt – The End is a New Beginning as its starting point and focuses on the Automatic Audio Tour. What began as a participatory audio experience has evolved into an autonomous artwork that gives tangible form to the concept of Post-Performance.

The film captures how visitors follow the tour’s instructions, shedding their role as spectators and becoming performers. At the same time, the viewer is drawn in, shifting from observer to participant. This interplay of roles and perspectives lies at the heart of Roelandt’s practice.

*PERFORMANCE – Are You Still Watching?, Sean Peleman
19:00–20:00, M HKA, 5th floor (Inbox)

Sean Peleman activates his INBOX presentation Are You Still Watching. “The ‘human fly’ is a ‘sci-fi celebrity,’ a pure pulp icon. You can’t ignore it, and it’s hard to see it as anything other than a deafening reference to pop culture.”

The performer is positioned on a red-velvet couch shaped like a Venus shell, its back facing the entrance to restrict direct access. Dressed in a costume derived from televised imagery, they embody a generic yet unapproachable figure—recognizable but anonymous. The performance explores the erosion of individual subjectivity within mediated environments. Television channels play automatically, with content programmed for non-human viewers—flies—while the act of channel-switching occurs without viewer input. This performance explores the possible relationships within disconnection: between performer and audience, viewer and content, presence and meaning. Who becomes the real fly in the room? The work reflects on both active and passive spectatorship and the Unprecedented role of conformity in contemporary media consumption.

*PERFORMANCE – Antwerp Graduation Prize
20:00–20:30, M HKA, 6th floor

Every year, two students with a master’s degree in fine arts are awarded the Antwerp Art Graduation Prize. In 2024, the laureates were Julia Tröscher, and Juli Bierich in collaboration with Emma Mann. Discover their newly produced works on M HKA’s 6th floor.

In the video work ‘Everything has been said, not done’, Julia Tröscher considers the impact of short-form video content as both a reflection of cultural values and a tool of escapism that fragments attention and thought. In ‘Brace, Brace’,  Juli Bierich and Emma Mann perform the setting of an airport waiting area—a liminal space between departure and arrival— exploring the tension between control and helplessness through safety instructions.

*Antwerp Art Weekend Opening Party
21:00-01:00, M HKA, 4th floor (M HKAFE and rooftop terrace)

Friday, 30.05.2025

*ANIMATED FILM – Stories in Motion, Inspired by Panamarenko
Ongoing, M HKA, ground floor

KASKA DKO, in collaboration with M HKA, presents a series of Panamarenko-inspired animated films created by children, youth, and adults from the Audiovisual, Film and Video Art, and Digital Visual Arts programs. Using self-designed vehicles, engaging storylines, and dynamic storyboards, they bring their own adventures to life.

*AUTOMATIC AUDIO TOUR – An English-language audio tour inspired by the work of Hugo Roelandt
Ongoing, M HKA, 2^nd floor: Hugo Roelandt

In English, bring your own earphones.

By Bernadette Zdrazil, Tibo Vergote, Noura Marien and Ethan Cannaert, students of the Educational Master’s programme at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp

An experimental audio tour that guides the visitor during their visit to the Hugo Roelandt exhibition. We provide you with a series of simple instructions to follow in the exhibition: “If you do exactly what we say, then you create the piece yourself.”

In this audio tour, the audience is challenged to move through the exhibition as a performer. Visitors are given the opportunity to actively participate and make choices within the exhibition.

*FILM – From Visitor to Performer: Hugo Roelandt and the Automatic Audio Tour
Ongoing, M HKA, 1st floor (Salon)
In English

This film takes the exhibition Hugo Roelandt – The End is a New Beginning as its starting point and focuses on the Automatic Audio Tour. What began as a participatory audio experience has evolved into an autonomous artwork that gives tangible form to the concept of Post-Performance.

The film captures how visitors follow the tour’s instructions, shedding their role as spectators and becoming performers. At the same time, the viewer is drawn in, shifting from observer to participant. This interplay of roles and perspectives lies at the heart of Roelandt’s practice.

Saturday 31.05.2025

Hugo Roelandt was not only an artist but also a photography teacher at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp. Collaboration with young creators was a natural part of his practice.

In that same spirit, today’s program focuses on contributions from students and alumni of the Academy. Their traces can be seen throughout the museum — in film, performance, and sound.

PERFORMANCE – Are You Still Watching?, Sean Peleman
15:00–17:00, M HKA, 5th floor (Inbox)

Sean Peleman activates his INBOX presentation Are You Still Watching. “The ‘human fly’ is a ‘sci-fi celebrity,’ a pure pulp icon. You can’t ignore it, and it’s hard to see it as anything other than a deafening reference to pop culture.”

The performer is positioned on a red-velvet couch shaped like a Venus shell, its back facing the entrance to restrict direct access. Dressed in a costume derived from televised imagery, they embody a generic yet unapproachable figure—recognizable but anonymous. The performance explores the erosion of individual subjectivity within mediated environments. Television channels play automatically, with content programmed for non-human viewers—flies—while the act of channel-switching occurs without viewer input. This performance explores the possible relationships within disconnection: between performer and audience, viewer and content, presence and meaning. Who becomes the real fly in the room? The work reflects on both active and passive spectatorship and the Unprecedented role of conformity in contemporary media consumption. :

*PERFORMANCE – Antwerp Graduation Prize
16:00–16:30, M HKA, 6th floor

Every year, two students with a master’s degree in fine arts are awarded the Antwerp Art Graduation Prize. In 2024, the laureates were Julia Tröscher, and Juli Bierich in collaboration with Emma Mann. Discover their newly produced works on M HKA’s 6th floor.

In the video work ‘Everything has been said, not done’, Julia Tröscher considers the impact of short-form video content as both a reflection of cultural values and a tool of escapism that fragments attention and thought. In ‘Brace, Brace’,  Juli Bierich and Emma Mann perform the setting of an airport waiting area—a liminal space between departure and arrival— exploring the tension between control and helplessness through safety instructions.

*ANIMATED FILM – Stories in Motion, Inspired by Panamarenko
Ongoing, M HKA, ground floor

KASKA DKO, in collaboration with M HKA, presents a series of Panamarenko-inspired animated films created by children, youth, and adults from the Audiovisual, Film and Video Art, and Digital Visual Arts programs. Using self-designed vehicles, engaging storylines, and dynamic storyboards, they bring their own adventures to life.

*AUTOMATIC AUDIO TOUR  – An English-language audio tour inspired by the work of Hugo Roelandt
Ongoing, 2^nd floor: Hugo Roelandt

In English, bring your own earphones.

By Bernadette Zdrazil, Tibo Vergote, Noura Marien and Ethan Cannaert, students of the Educational Master’s programme at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp

An experimental audio tour that guides the visitor during their visit to the Hugo Roelandt exhibition. We provide you with a series of simple instructions to follow in the exhibition: “If you do exactly what we say, then you create the piece yourself.”

In this audio tour, the audience is challenged to move through the exhibition as a performer. Visitors are given the opportunity to actively participate and make choices within the exhibition.

*FILM – From Visitor to Performer: Hugo Roelandt and the Automatic Audio Tour
Ongoing, M HKA, 1st floor (Salon)
In English

This film takes the exhibition Hugo Roelandt – The End is a New Beginning as its starting point and focuses on the Automatic Audio Tour. What began as a participatory audio experience has evolved into an autonomous artwork that gives tangible form to the concept of Post-Performance.

The film captures how visitors follow the tour’s instructions, shedding their role as spectators and becoming performers. At the same time, the viewer is drawn in, shifting from observer to participant. This interplay of roles and perspectives lies at the heart of Roelandt’s practice.

*WHAT’S THE POINT?
Ongoing, M HKA

Together with current third-year BA art students from the Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp, we reflected on the contemporary relevance of Hugo Roelandt’s work. During the Antwerp Art Weekend, some of the students’ ideas will be made visible.

Sunday 1.06.2025

Relive the work of Hugo Roelandt with a re-enactment of his Aeromatic Art Project 1 (1983) and a tour led by curators Joanna Zielińska and Marc Holthof, former assistant and friend of the artist.

A day that looks back at Roelandt’s original context and artistic vision — and shows how his work continues to resonate.

*PERFORMANCE – Aeromatic Art Project 1 (1983), Hugo Roelandt by Wase Model Helicopters Club
11:00-11:15, Zuidpark (public space near the M HKA), Vlaamsekaai, 2000 Antwerp
16:00-16:15, M HKA, the event takes place on the rooftop terrace.

In 1983, Hugo Roelandt premiered the Aeromatic Art Project 1, a performance in which model helicopter pilots attempted to keep their aircraft hovering in exactly the same spot in the air. This project was part of a series of works about play, technology and movement. It also referred to the old human dream of flight, a fascination that lives on in the media and video games. Here, technology was used as artistic material without symbolic references – the technology was present in its own right.

*GUIDED TOUR – Performing Archives by Marc Holthof & Joanna Zielinska
14:00-15:00, M HKA, 2^nd floor

Bilingual: English and Dutch

Price: included in the museum ticket – reserve your spot via Eventbrite and buy your ticket on site. For more information on ticket prices, visit muhka.be.

This expert tour is a dialogue between Marc Holthof, formerly Hugo Roelandt’s assistant and writer, and Joanna Zielińska, performance curator at M HKA. We invite you to participate in a conversation about the exhibition and discover an unconventional perspective on performance art through the lens of the archive and the museum collection. Holthof will investigate the historical and local context in which Roelandt created his work, while Zielińska discusses the challenges of archiving ephemeral art.

*THE SALON – Play with Expression
Open continuously, M HKA, 1st floor
14:00-16:00: Guided session

In the Salon on the first floor, you can engage in research and play. Here, you’ll find materials and tasks inspired by the artistic practices of Hugo Roelandt and Panamarenko.

Between 14:00 and 16:00, join our guide Nele as you dive into the world of Hugo Roelandt. During this session, you’ll explore his bold style with a dress-up and photo session full of expression and experimentation. Play, push your boundaries, and colour outside the lines!

*ANIMATED FILM – Stories in Motion, Inspired by Panamarenko
Ongoing, M HKA, ground floor

KASKA DKO, in collaboration with M HKA, presents a series of Panamarenko-inspired animated films created by children, youth, and adults from the Audiovisual, Film and Video Art, and Digital Visual Arts programs. Using self-designed vehicles, engaging storylines, and dynamic storyboards, they bring their own adventures to life.

*AUTOMATIC AUDIO TOUR  – An English-language audio tour inspired by the work of Hugo Roelandt
Ongoing, 2^nd floor: Hugo Roelandt

In English, bring your own earphones.

By Bernadette Zdrazil, Tibo Vergote, Noura Marien and Ethan Cannaert, students of the Educational Master’s programme at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp

An experimental audio tour that guides the visitor during their visit to the Hugo Roelandt exhibition. We provide you with a series of simple instructions to follow in the exhibition: “If you do exactly what we say, then you create the piece yourself.”

In this audio tour, the audience is challenged to move through the exhibition as a performer. Visitors are given the opportunity to actively participate and make choices within the exhibition.

*FILM – From Visitor to Performer: Hugo Roelandt and the Automatic Audio Tour
Ongoing, M HKA, 1st floor (Salon)
In English

This film takes the exhibition Hugo Roelandt – The End is a New Beginning as its starting point and focuses on the Automatic Audio Tour. What began as a participatory audio experience has evolved into an autonomous artwork that gives tangible form to the concept of Post-Performance.

The film captures how visitors follow the tour’s instructions, shedding their role as spectators and becoming performers. At the same time, the viewer is drawn in, shifting from observer to participant. This interplay of roles and perspectives lies at the heart of Roelandt’s practice.