The artist collective Sunflower Soup was founded in 2021 by a group of artists from the Netherlands. The collective was born out of a shared activist interest and the need to explore what art can mean beyond the confines of the individual. Sunflower Soup believes in shared authorship and wants to explore the extent to which radical collaboration is applicable in the visual arts. In doing so, the collective is driven by a number of questions: Can a shared way of working contribute to a less detached experience of art? How do people relate to each other and to the non-human world? How can we reconcile the importance of activism with a poetic visual language that also allows for humor and ambiguity?

In their work they co create with each other but also with the audiences and non-humans, recycling each other’s creations, aiming for a true consciousness. In the gallery they show a collage of works in which they react to each other’s actions. The collage flows out of their work Plantriachy, which exposes an alternate version of reality in which plants are the dominant force. References to the natural, non-human world, thus pop up throughout. As part of the installation workshops are scheduled in which the academic community can engage in alternate way beyond literal reading with academic knowledge material that will be recycled. Also part of the installation are two benches made by recycled books from the University Library, creating possibility to interact in a dialogue. The collective has also created a zine in in which they explore the parallels in open production between artistic and academic communities.