Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz at NEST, The Hague

Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz present their new exhibition Fog Is My Drug at Nest in Laak, exploring the tension between visibility and invisibility. They embrace Édouard Glissant’s concept of the “right to opacity”, linking it to (queer) nightlife and the “abstract club”, connecting to the neighbouring club Laak.

In the video installation in the exhibition, El Cristal Es Mi Piel, musician Aérea Negrot performs a song, co-written with the artists, that gives voice to Madrid’s Palacio de Cristal and its colonial past. Built in 1887 for the colonial Exposición de las Filipinas, the palace’s transparent architecture symbolises a colonial gaze aiming to observe and control. Boudry and Lorenz question how the building can confront this history, imagining it as a “ghost” seeking revenge – cracking, leaking, and letting nature in. Using mirrored stages, they offer new perspectives, while smoke gradually obscures the palace’s transparency, challenging its original purpose.

Édouard Glissant (1928–2011) argued in his work that transparency is not always necessary, especially in culture and history. His critique of colonialism and the Western urge to categorise and fully comprehend everything, led to his idea that people and cultures have the right to remain partially unknowable, or ‘opaque’. Opacity, then, is not a lack of knowledge, but a way to create space for the unknown, the fluid, and the elusive.

With Fog Is My Drug, Boudry and Lorenz embrace the concept of the “right to opacity” and connect it to the (queer) nightlife and the “abstract club.” Rather than being a place where gender, sexuality, or bodily abilities are irrelevant, the abstract club is a space that challenges the way we think about these categories. The artists therefore invite visitors to reflect on their own position and the supposed “right” to see and understand everything. They also reference the neighbouring club Laak, where darkness and smoke play a significant role. Both the exhibition space and the palace in the video momentarily obscure their surroundings with smoke, potentially becoming an abstract club – a tangible space for difference and collaboration.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Since 2007, artists Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz have worked together in Berlin, creating films that stage performances inspired by songs, images, or films from the recent past. Their work challenges conventional historical narratives and ways of looking by layering and reimagining figures and actions across time. Collaborating closely with choreographers, artists and musicians, they explore themes of visibility, the politics of performance, and the tensions between oppression, companionship, and resistance.