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Woensdag 11:00 - 18:00 Donderdag 11:00 - 18:00 Vrijdag 11:00 - 21:00 Zaterdag 11:00 - 18:00 Zondag 11:00 - 18:00

Kunstinstituut Melly

Name: Kunstinstituut Melly
Address: Witte de Withstraat 50, Rotterdam, 3012BR, NL
Telephone: +31 (0) 10 4110144
Price range: £
Rating: 4.3

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Nederland
Rotterdam
Kunstinstituut Melly

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Founded in 1990, the institution was conceived as an art house with a mission to present and discuss
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Kunstinstituut Melly is an international public institution with Rotterdam as its home base. Established in 1990, the institution explores developments in contemporary art worldwide. We have been commenting on the social and political predicament since its inception through the presentation of exhibitions, symposia, live events, educational programs, and a bold publication arm.

19/10/2026

✨ Opening: You will find us in the best places: a survey exhibition of Moshekwa Langa ✨

Join us this Saturday, 24 October, for the opening of You will find us in the best places, a major survey exhibition by South African artist Moshekwa Langa. Featuring nearly 120 works from the past three decades, the exhibition occupies the entire building, making it the largest overview of Moshekwa’s work to be presented in the Netherlands, where he has lived for more than 25 years.

Curated by Gabi Ngcobo, Director of Kunstinstituut Melly, together with curator Kabelo Malatsie, the exhibition offers a moment to reflect on Moshekwa’s practice across three decades. Choreographed around recurring themes, questions, and interests, it traces time not linearly, but through their continuous unfolding across his work.

Swipe through for the full opening day program, including opening words by Gabi Ngcobo and Kabelo Malatsie, a map of moments, stitched together as a timeline of Moshekwa Langa’s practice guided by Thato Makatu and Elijah Rhode, a playful activity for children and families, the activation of the new MELLY Cantina by George Mahashe, and music by DJ Jollyfish alongside food from Street Food Gallery. 💫

→ Doors open at 12:00 PM
✨ Official opening program begins at 2:30 PM

🗺️ Join us for the opening on 24 October.

🔗 More information via this link: https://www.kunstinstituutmelly.nl/en/programs/9669-opening-you-will-find-us-in-the-best-places-a

Image credits:
Image 1: Moshekwa Langa, Temporal Distance (with a criminal intent). You will find us in the best places…
Image 2: TOOLSHED #3 – After Library. Notes and Plans, Thulile Gamedze and Tlotliso Skefu.
Image 3: Photography by Aad Hoogendoorn.
Image 4: Moshekwa Langa, Brenda (previously exhibited under the name I Love My Pashmina), 2002. Photography by Mario Toedeschini.
Image 5: Photography by Klarka Batek.
Image 6: Moshekwa Langa, Collapsing Guide II, mixed media and collage on plastic film. Photography by Mario Toedeschini.
Image 7: Sketch, Vuragelameshoga: Leḽago la vakhegulu, George Mahashe.
Image 9: Photography by Cedric Veldhuis.

14/10/2026

✨ Part 2: Behind the Scenes with Jeroen ✨

The installation continues! Join for another behind-the-scenes look at how You will find us in the best places: a survey exhibition of Moshekwa Langa is taking shape at Kunstinstituut Melly.

From building new walls and preparing a giant easel for Moshekwa’s drawings to assembling the Durer Solid, there’s plenty to do before the exhibition opens across all four floors.

✨ Want a closer look before the opening?
On Friday 16 October at 16:30, Friends of Melly are invited to a special installation preview during the final stages of the exhibition’s preparation. Registration is open until Thursday 14 October!

❤️ Become a Friend of Melly from €35 per year and enjoy exclusive invitations to previews and tours, free access to Melly throughout the year, and discounts on publications and merchandise.

📍You will find us in the best places: a survey exhibition of Moshekwa Langa
🗓️ Opening: Saturday 24 October 2026, 12:00–19:00

💫 See you next week for Part 3!

13/10/2026

🌀“What does it mean to have a body that is affected by technology?” We asked the CLiPpers from CLiP #8: What the Body Refuses to Give.🌀

Meet the CLiP #8 makers: Erida, Alexandra, Ermis, Jassey, Kayla, Lucía, Dora, Matilde, Mariana, and Evîn.

Following our open call, we welcome a new group of Rotterdam-based young people. Over six months, they’ll explore collective (un)learning across AI systems, embodied knowledge, glitches, and the limits of legibility through readings, choreographic prompting, body mapping, and hybrid practices.

The program is divided into three main sections: Reading, Misreading, and Rewriting. Together, the CLiPpers will explore how technology affects us as bodies, minds, and social beings. Through creating, questioning, and discussing, they’ll develop new perspectives, methods, and ethical approaches to the impact of technological systems and AI, alongside researchers, artists, and others working on these urgent topics.

During our first session, we explored how to distort, acknowledge, and challenge the body. In pairs and trios, the CLiPpers experimented with unconventional portraits, playing with movement, balance, points of contact, and alternative perspectives to create a collective, asynchronous body.

CLiP #8: What the Body Refuses to Give takes place at Kunstinstituut Melly from 9 October 2026 to 26 March 2027.

🔗 Find more info via the link in bio

Photography: former CLiPper Janey Roanna

12/10/2026

💙 Want to become a Friend of Melly?💙

In this video, Roos tells you more about the Friends programme of Melly and what it means to be part of our community.

✨ Here’s what you get as a Friend of Melly:

• Free access to Melly throughout the year
• 20% discount on our merchandise and own publications
• Invitations to exclusive events, special tours, keynotes, workshops and openings
• Free tickets to art fairs such as Art Rotterdam, Art Antwerp and Art Brussels
• Access to a network of fellow Friends of Melly
• Behind-the-scenes tours and exhibition previews, including spaces usually closed to visitors
• The chance to be the first to hear what’s happening at Melly

And there’s more! By becoming a Friend, you directly support Melly in giving artists space to experiment and create new work, bringing different voices and narratives together, and preserving our monumental building while making it more sustainable.

👀 Your first behind-the-scenes moment is coming up! 👀

On Friday 16 October at 4:30 pm, Friends of Melly are invited to an exclusive preview of You will find us in the best places, a survey exhibition by Moshekwa Langa, during the final stage of installation. Join Elijah, who conducted the research for the exhibition, and Jeroen, who oversees installations at Melly, for a special tour of the building and exhibition spaces.
Become a Friend from just €35 per year (or more if you’re able).

🔗 Sign up via the link in our bio or visit our website and head to ‘Support Us’.

Video: Friends Tour, Draw Withdraw Redraw
Installation photos: Simnikiwe Buhlungu: hygrosummons (iter.02), Kristien Daem
Museum Night photo: Liza Wolters
Keynote lecture by Hazem Jamjoum: Tim Sluijter
Workshop with Rayaan Ettaghdouini: Michelle Piergoelam

07/10/2026

✨Part 1: Behind the Scenes with Jeroen ✨

What does it take to prepare four floors for a new exhibition? Over the coming weeks, will take us behind the scenes as You will find us in the best places: a survey exhibition of Moshekwa Langa comes together at Kunstinstituut Melly.

From painting walls and building structures to unpacking and condition-checking nearly 120 works, there’s a lot happening before our doors open......

Emerging in the early years of post-apartheid South Africa, Moshekwa Langa belongs to a generation of artists who worked with the new enthusiasm sweeping through the country at the time. His practice is characterised by wit and irreverence, with a fearless use of materials from his immediate environment.

Opening 24 October, the exhibition offers a pause to reflect on Moshekwa’s practice across three decades, tracing recurring themes, questions and interests as they continuously unfold.

💫 Part 2 coming next week!

📍You will find us in the best places: a survey exhibition of Moshekwa Langa
24 October 2026 — 28 March 2027

🔗 More information via the link in bio.

06/10/2026

📚 Recap: Publication-binding workshop with Felipe Mujica
During the last weekend of Draw Withdraw Redraw, Felipe Mujica presented his new artist book Mijn Klok Staat Stil. In this workshop, participants got hands-on with binding the publication. Guided by Felipe, they learned the cahier stitch, a simple binding technique often used for zines and other small publications.
Mijn Klok Staat Stil is a documentation of the embroidery workshop by Felipe, in which the works were made that were on view in Draw Withdraw Redraw. The publication contains risograph prints and digital colour copies of drawings from his sketchbook. This sketchbook, with its own grid and internal logic, formed the starting point for his textile projects. The drawings came from research into Western and Indigenous traditions of geometric abstraction, and into different regional textile traditions. From a fixed set of rules, new compositions were created through small variations and additions.
The publication will soon be available in our webshop!

30/09/2026

✨Friday at Melly✨

💫 Every Friday, Kunstinstituut Melly is open for free from 6–9 PM → the perfect way to start your weekend!

This Friday is extra special because it's also Kunstavond! On the first Friday of every month, the Witte de With art quarter comes alive as the neighbourhood's leading contemporary art spaces open their doors for a shared evening of exhibitions and special programmes. Wander between V2_, WORM, MaMA, and Kunstinstituut Melly, all within one block.

📚 Publication-binding workshop with Felipe Mujica
Friday 2 October | 6:30–8:30 PM
To mark the final weekend of Draw Withdraw Redraw, Felipe Mujica will launch his small-edition artist book Mijn Klok Staat Stil and lead a publication-binding workshop. Together, participants will stitch the publication using the saddle-stitch technique, commonly used for zines. No previous experience is needed!

📣 Last chance to visit Draw Withdraw Redraw!
The workshop with Felipe Mujica takes place on the third floor, within Draw Withdraw Redraw, the group exhibition bringing together work by AYO, Bani Abidi, Cinthia Marcelle, Felipe Mujica, Misheck Masamvu, Nohemí Pérez and Thierry Oussou. The exhibition foregrounds recognition, resistance, and reinvention, situating us in a state of ongoingness, returning to the same that is never the same. The artists featured in the exhibition use drawing as a way to begin a journey, withdrawing to self-preserve and practice refusal and redraw to begin again, with a refreshed understanding.

✨ The Legendaries
A new work by Cinthia Marcelle, added to Draw Withdraw Redraw. Inspired by a 1942 collective photograph by Hermann Landshoff, the work shifts the focus towards people often missing from official narratives, but whose presence was essential to the construction and continuity of institutions.

💫 Draw Withdraw Redraw closes Sunday 4 October, so come by this Friday for the Publication-binding workshop and see the exhibition before it closes!

🎟 Free admission every Friday: 6–9 PM
🌙 Kunstavond: First Friday of every month
🎫 A free Kunstavond ticket is required to visit all participating venues and attend the evening's programme.
📍 Kunstinstituut Melly, Rotterdam
🔗 Reserve your free Kunstavond ticket via this link: https://www.kunstinstituutmelly.nl/en/programs/10352-friday-at-melly

30/09/2026

✨ Book Presentation and Workshop at Wiels Art Book Fair 2026! ✨

Join us on Sunday 4 October at Wiels Art Book Fair 2026, where we will be hosting a workshop and presentation of The Garage School of Prepping Otherwise: Collective Learning in Practice.

This coming weekend, WIELS in Brussels hosts a selection of independent publishers from a wide range of backgrounds, presenting everything from fanzines and artists’ books to limited editions. During the fair, we will host a book presentation and workshop in which we will explore and activate key ideas from The Garage School of Prepping Otherwise, with a focus on tools of/for collective imagining.

This publication is the outcome of the 2025–2026 Collective Learning in Practice (CLiP #7) programme curated by The Garage School at Kunstinstituut Melly. Over six months, fourteen co-learners worked with a range of guests and collaborators to develop tools, methodologies, skills, and stories in response to the question “What Can It Mean to Survive Together?”

Against a backdrop of polycrises, militarisation, and European governments advising their citizens to ‘prep’, the school explored how we might reject individualism and relate ‘otherwise’ to the question of preparedness and survival. Drawing from multiple disciplines, the school explored both foundational and unexpected aspects of community prepping and collective survival, including health, infrastructure, archiving, collapse, food, imagination, and relationality.

The resulting material not only documents the school but also translates its process into (pedagogical) tools, methodologies, insights, and games through which we might collectively approach the question of survival with curiosity, solidarity, and imagination.

✨ Sunday 4th October 2026
🕓 15:00 - 16:00
📍 Wiels Seminar Room
🎟 FREE / GRATIS

🔗 More info: https://www.kunstinstituutmelly.nl/en/programs/10333-boekpresentatie-en-workshop-op-de-wiels-art-book-fair-2026

Images: Book Launch of The Garage School of Prepping Otherwise: Collective Learning in Practice, Kunstinstituut Melly, 11 September 2026 · 📸 Regina Korkovelou

29/09/2026

🛠️Melly closed from 5–23 October

From Monday 5 October, the whole building of Melly will prepare for the installation of You will find us in the best places, a survey exhibition of Moshekwa Langa.

📌Final week to visit Draw Withdraw Redraw
This is the last week to visit Draw Withdraw Redraw, which closes on Sunday 4 October. The group exhibition features work by AYO, Bani Abidi, Cinthia Marcelle, Felipe Mujica, Misheck Masamvu, Nohemi Perez, and Thierry Oussou.

🧵 Closing Program
On Friday 2 October, on the occasion of the last weekend of the exhibition, artist Felipe Mujica will launch his small-edition artist book and guide participants to stitch the publication through a saddle-stitch binding workshop.

🎨 Closing: Education & Participation Space
During the installation of You Will Find Us in the Best Places, there will be no Free Saturday Workshops from 3 October. They return on 31 October, each led by a different artist and inspired by the exhibition.

✨Opening on 24 October
On October 24, Kunstinstituut Melly will open You will find us in the best places, a major survey exhibition of South African artist Moshekwa Langa. Featuring nearly 120 works from the past three decades, the exhibition will occupy the entire building, making it the largest overview of Moshekwa’s work to be presented in the Netherlands, where he has lived for more than 25 years.

👀 Keep an eye out on our socials: we’ll be sharing glimpses of the installation, conversations, interviews, and other things along the way.

More info: https://www.kunstinstituutmelly.nl/en/exhibitions/10331-melly-is-closed-from-5-23-october

Photo 1: Museumnacht 2026. Photo by: Liza Wolters
Photo 2: Misheck Masamvu, Thawing, Pamasonga, Fire pit, Shedding skin, Bird bath, Scaffolding, Test, The find, in Draw Withdraw Redraw at Kunstinstituut Melly. Photo: Kristien Daem
photo 3: Felipe Mujica, MIJN KLOK STAAT STIL, in Draw Withdraw Redraw at Kunstinstituut Melly. Photo: Kristien Daem
Photo 4: Free Saturday Workshop by Carmen José. Photo: Silvia Arenas
Photo 5: Moshekwa Langa, Temporal Distance (With Criminal Intent). You Will Find Us in the Best Places., 1997–2009. Installation view, 53rd Venice Biennale, 2009. Photo: © Haupt & Binder, Universes in Universe.

Adres

Witte De Withstraat 50
Rotterdam
3012BR

Openingstijden

Woensdag	11:00 - 18:00
Donderdag	11:00 - 18:00
Vrijdag	11:00 - 21:00
Zaterdag	11:00 - 18:00
Zondag	11:00 - 18:00

Telefoon

+31 (0) 10 4110144

Website

https://www.kunstinstituutmelly.nl/

Meldingen

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