Ruth Boer

Over the past few years, I have evolved into a multidisciplinary artist, creating works that incorporate audio, video, and distinctive visual design. As a theatre maker with a passion for the raw, unsettling stories emerging from the underbelly of society, I am heading into the professional field—or rather, taking to the barricades!

What inspires me
Enigmatic art that demands prolonged contemplation. Social constructs and systemic flaws—or simply the way societal systems come into being. The authors of books I strive to understand. And the strength and beauty of my friends who persevere despite depression and various forms of neurodivergence.
 

What is my ambition or vision for the future?
I hope we can position ourselves more consciously in relation to technology and social media, and that we can choose whether to continue as we are or if something needs to change. I hope I ask just as many questions. That I remain critical and question power. I hope that the working class—for whom I create art—finds the motivation to speak with their neighbors, employers, and politicians.

I hope that, united, we hold the guilty accountable—by demanding a free press, by boycotting as a form of protest, and by voting for policies that protect everyone. I hope we raise our children together within a community. That has to start small, with individuals prompting others to think. It starts with an employee speaking up and questioning their boss. It starts with Gen Z deciding—after serving as guinea pigs for a techno-feudal society—that enough is enough. It starts with small-scale anti-capitalist resistance. With looking for alternatives to the likes of ING and Albert Heijn. It starts with you. Then a community. Then the masses. Then the world.

So, after my studies, I’m going to start doing *something*. And preferably not on my own.

I hope to start a collective and launch projects as a visual theatre maker/artist and I would like to further specialize as an installation artist.

What will you see during finals?
The Pigs & The Pulp Eaters is an interactive video installation about social media, algorithms and big tech.The public — whether or not they take the actions we have planned for them — must sit with our topics. And walk away with a sticker stuck to their limb that reads: 'Is this how you would like to continue?'

A question we hope gets asked more often.

The Pigs & The Pulp Eaters is het Afstudeer werk van Ruth Boer -  ArtEZ Artist educator in Theater & Media.

In collaboration with Joran Groeneweg – HKU Interactive Performance Design.

Through this installation and the accompanying side program that serves as its extension—I hope we can look Big Tech companies in the eye. And that you, my audience, will come to see them as I have come to see them over the past few months.

Ze zijn niet onze vrienden.

Our media and the associated technology (phones, laptops, iPads, and indeed our own limbs)—have become more than just tools that make our daily lives easier and more interesting. They represent an assault on freedom, democracy, and equality. Big Tech companies rake in trillions from our time, information, and interactions. Meanwhile, in the background and out of the mainstream media's view, technologies for killer drones are being developed, and slave labor is being exploited to produce our microchips.

Complicity > going along with something, but out of ignorance. ??

This is how they keep us in the dark while simultaneously making us complicit in upholding their system.

Internship:
Theater Group Woest Oost – podcast creator and researcher for a project on youth care services – assistant director