Marjike de Roover

Marijke De Roover
Niche Content for Frustrated Queers, 2019-ongoing
Series of C-prints mounted on Dibond with aluminium subframe, 70 x 70 cm each
Courtesy of the artist and Arcade, London/Brussels

Niche Content for Frustrated Queers is a series of memes created by Marijke de Roover. According to the artist, memes are texts that “carry instructions for the reproduction of culture”, rely on normative power structures, and spread stereotypical representations. They are largely hostile, excluding anyone who does not identify as white and male, thus affirming heteronormativity. Marijke de Roover’s edgy memes reflect the Millennial generation’s sense of pessimism, insecurity and self-mockery, but also reflect on peer pressure, obsession with self-representation, and the difficulty of conforming to norms of, for example, beauty. They demonstrate how institutionalised heterosexuality structures gender and offer an insight into the reality and the of dating and relationships, regardless of gender and sexual preferences. In the same time, they comment upon unrealized expectations created by the digital illusion, where imagination and reality do not always meet.

Marijke de Roover’s work explores the performativity of identity and focuses on feminism, queerness, sexuality and desire, aided and abetted by an iconography and language culled from the culture of the internet and entertainment industry. In her artworks, she also deals with questions regarding the nuclear family, feminism/motherhood, the ethics of reproduction, love and romance under late capitalism. Her practice ultimately undermines institutionalised and heteronormative notions about the latter.

Biography

Marijke De Roover is a part-time professional karaoke singer and meme connoisseur, yet currently known mostly for her queer/feminist performance work. She holds a Masters in Fine Arts from KASK School of Arts, Ghent (BE) where she was nominated for the Start Point Prize, Prague (CZ). In her artworks, she deals with questions regarding the nuclear family, feminism/motherhood, ethics of reproduction, and love, romance and compulsory heteronormativity under late capitalism. In 2020 she had her first institutional solo at Museum de Pont in Tilburg (NE). Her work has been shown at among others: Centre Pompidou, Paris (FR), Museum fur Neue Kunst, Freiburg (DE), David Roberts Art Foundation (Evening of Performance), London (UK), Garage Rotterdam (NL), Brakke Grond, Amsterdam (NL), Garage, Moscow (RU), BOZAR, Brussels (BE), ARCADE, London (UK), Goethe Institute, Dusseldorf (DE) and Museum Angewandte Kunst, Frankfurt am Main (DE).

https://www.marijkederoover.space/

 

 

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