Beach Legends

What if we had new stories about the nature around us? Myths that show us how magical, beautiful and sometimes awe-inspiring nature can be?

In 2024 I was artist in residence at StrandLAB on Almere Beach. The beach sits on the border of old and new: new land, surrounded by centuries-old water. A public place where very different people come together. With residents of Almere Duin, beachgoers and young people from the asylum seekers’ centre in Almere, I invented modern myths about the beach, the dunes and the water.

The stories were made in workshops with a simple game: Once upon a time… who wants… but… so… And in the end… We meet a fire mistress who keeps the village warm against the Ice Army, a dead lobster looking for a magic branch, a sad fairy in love with a gnome, Neptune lost in the fresh water of the IJ, and a lonely dragon in the lake.

The images that go with the stories were made with materials from the beach itself. Drawings with ink made from blackberries, nettles and flowers from the dunes, and cyanotypes developed in the water of the IJmeer and exposed by the sun. Everything came together in the publication Strandlegendes (Beach Legends), part of StrandLAB’s series Strandvertalingen.