Verena Blok

Verena Blok (b. 1990, The Netherlands) studied at the Royal Academy of Arts (KABK) in the Hague and AKV I St. Joost in Breda. She has recently been selected as a resident for the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten 2020-2021. Her work has been exhibited at venues including Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam; Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam; Utrecht Central Station, and Galeria Fotografii PF, Poznań (PL). Her latest film ‘Robota’ (2018) has been acquired by Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam for its permanent collection.

Verena has a deep interest in personal histories and narrative storytelling. Intrigued by the way cultural and political factors influence one’s life, she uses her lens-based practice to shed light on inner life and everyday “reality” in intimate settings. The encounter with the subject is the core of and the fuel for her work. To a large extent, Blok’s photography and video work is driven by the complex, paradoxical, tragic, and sometimes humorous set of social and cultural relations that form everyday life in Poland. As a Dutch-Polish dual citizen raised in The Netherlands and The United States, Blok has a keen awareness of her position moving between East and West. By coming close to her subjects and embedding herself for stretches of time, she uses these locations as her studio, a backdrop to the narratives that both artist and subject become part of.