For Art Düsseldorf 2026, Dürst Britt & Mayhew is proud to present Puck Verkade’s video project Uprooted, which proposes an ecological worldview beyond human dominance, centred on coexistence with plants and animals, shared intelligence, and deep interdependency.
Uprooted unfolds within a vibrant, sculptural, site-specific installation that brings together performance, hand-drawn animation, lyrical narration, and musical composition (in collaboration with Thomas van Linge). The film follows a protagonist who descends into a rabbit hole–like, transformative space, where she becomes entangled in the generative processes of a speculative world. The project emerged from Verkade’s post-partum experience, which felt as a profound, almost psychedelic shift in perception. Since its first commission for the 8th Yokohama Triennale in Japan, the project has expanded through a series of “growths”, including sculptures, an inflatable cinema, drawings, and animations; and exhibited at C5CNM in Beijing and De Nederlandsche Bank in Amsterdam.
Verkade’s practice is known for blending personal narratives with broader socio-political and ecological questions, combining digital techniques with handmade craftsmanship to explore complex issues across emotional landscapes. With Uprooted, she extends this approach by engaging with the uncertainties of raising a child in a time of ecological and social crisis. Rather than resorting to moralising, the work advances a more-than-human perspective grounded in interdependency, proposing a reconfiguration of interspecies relations. In doing so, it invites a reconsideration of how we relate to the more-than-human world and the forms of care such entanglements demand.
Click here to read a specially commissioned essay by Nadeche Remst
Puck Verkade (1987) is a Dutch artist based in Berlin. She creates installations, sculptures, and videos that draw viewers into surreal, cartoon-like worlds where comedy and critique intertwine.
Verkade received her BFA from the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and completed an MFA in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, London. Her work has been shown at various international venues, including the 16e Biennale de Lyon; the Yokohama Triennale, Japan; Multi Media Art Triennial Beijing, China; C5CNM, Beijing, China; Artissima Art Fair in Turin; Wroclaw Contemporary Museum in Poland; IKOB Museum, Eupen, Belgium; De Nederlandsche Bank, Amsterdam, The Netherlands; LISTE Art Fair and Kunstmuseum Gegenwart Basel. She was selected as a 2017-2018 resident artist at Sarabande The Lee Alexander McQueen Foundation in London. In 2021 she received the prestigious Charlotte Koehler Prize from the Prins Bernhard Culture Fund in The Netherlands.
Verkade’s work is held in private and public collections internationally such as Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Turin, De Nederlandsche Bank in Amsterdam, Servais Family Collection in Brussels, EKARD Collection in Wassenaar, Blue Knowlwedge Art Collection in Amsterdam, amongst others. Since 2018 Verkade has been invited to teach, lecture and host workshops at various BA and MA degrees across Europe and the UK.
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