Stef Van Looveren — COSMIC BODY – First Incision

M HKA presents a new site-specific installation and performance by Belgian multidisciplinary artist Stef Van Looveren, as part of the IN SITU programme. The project approaches the museum space as a hybrid of temple, body and alchemical laboratory, focusing on material transformation – melting, merging and mirroring – as a way to explore change as both ritual and embodied experience.

Performance OPUS II

The performance OPUS II (17.01.2026), on Art’s Birthday, opens the exhibition and forms the first chapter of the work. Rather than encountering a completed installation, visitors witness a space taking shape in real time through a ritualised procession in which performers carry and activate objects. This process forms the spatial and symbolic framework of the exhibition and determines the logic that guides its later configuration.

Connected system

At the centre of Van Looveren’s work are three sound-producing sculptural forms. These sculptures refer to organ-like structures, egg and seed forms, bell shapes and archetypal vessels, and connect with alchemical ideas in which matter has both a physical and a symbolic dimension. Light interacting with silvered surfaces generates constantly shifting reflections, while the movements of performers and visitors abstract figurative references and make themes such as life cycles, decay and renewal visible. The installation broadly reflects the structure of a tree of life and suggests an interconnected system of forms and energies.

The work invites visitors into an inner, introspective space where social conditioning can be questioned. Van Looveren describes this as a form of “shadow work”, exploring what remains when learned and inherited roles and identities lose their meaning.

Alchemical processes

Alchemical processes – dissolution, transformation, reconfiguration – serve as metaphors for fluid identity, queerness and the refusal of binary thinking. References to cyborg bodies, androgyny and intersex embodiments emphasise the capacity for continuous metamorphosis. Silvered bodies evoke medical, futuristic and sacred resonances at once – part surgery, part machine, part divine.

Sound functions as a structural element. The music works like a mantra, built on repetition, reflecting the cycles of life. The sequence begins with the artist’s voice – both vulnerable and identity-forming – connecting sound with gender expression, healing and strength. The voice unfolds through bells, tuned objects and live instruments.

Flux

Throughout the exhibition, materials remain in motion and surfaces melt, keeping the installation in a state of flux. This reflects Van Looveren’s broader practice, which questions fixed ideas about the body and embraces continuous transformation. The result is a space of ongoing becoming – open, reflective and rooted in the physical presence of bodies, sound and materials.

You can download the brochure here.

About the artist

Stef Van Looveren is a Belgian multidisciplinary artist working with performance, video, sculpture and installation. Their practice explores gender identity, queerness and the performative nature of the body, questioning – through humour, camp aesthetics and prosthetic objects – how identities are formed, restricted and liberated.

About IN SITU

M HKA’s IN SITU programme invites international artists to create new site-specific works in the museum’s unique space. The programme supports experimentation and highlights innovative voices within contemporary art.