Between 1961 and 1965, the versatile artist Armando (1929-2018) joined forces with Jan Schoonhoven, Henk Peeters, and Jan Henderikse to form the now world-famous Nul Group, the Dutch subdivision of the international ZERO movement. One of the group’s key principles was elevating everyday objects and industrial materials into art. Armando became particularly well-known for his wall pieces, which he created from sheets of metal, bolts, and barbed wire. Far lesser-known are the immersive installations he made during the same period. For the first time ever, Stedelijk Museum Schiedam is now bringing these four installations together in a single exhibition. Furthermore, one of these installations, created in the run-up to the formation of the Nul group, will be shown for first time since 1958. The works are presented alongside installations by contemporary artists Zalán Szakács, Gabey Tjon a Tham and the art collective Touki Delphine.
The exhibition ties in with the collection of Stedelijk Museum Schiedam, which includes seventeen works by Armando and a broad selection of work by the Nul Group as a whole. The museum has been collecting and presenting work by both Nul artists and other radically abstract artists for a long time.
With their aloof and businesslike visual language, Armando and his fellow Nul Group members aimed to eliminate the hand of the artist from their work as much as possible. Art was no longer required to be pictorial. ‘Everything was beautiful, it felt as if I were a single big eye’, Armando later remarked when he looked back on this period.
Armando, 9 Bouten op rode achtergrond, (9 bolts on red background), 1961, Collection Stedelijk Museum Schiedam, Schiedam, donation‘GIFTED ART’, c/o Pictoright Amsterdam 2026, photo John Tromp
Rarely shown installations
The Nul group is often associated with wall pieces featuring repetitive patterns and monochrome surfaces. Armando demonstrated that these same principles could also be applied to three-dimensional space by means of four installations that are rarely exhibited today: an early, untitled installation from 1958, his 1962 Autobandenwand (Car Tyre Wall) and the 1964 installations Zwart water (Black Water) and Rode vaten, zwarte vaten (Red Drums, Black Drums). In these works, order, repetition, and neutrality are not just visible, but physically tangible as well.
Armando’s installations have never been presented together before. In 1962 and 1964, three of the works were shown during high-profile ZERO exhibitions at Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and the Gemeentemuseum (now Kunstmuseum) in The Hague. The earliest of the four installations was only ever exhibited in 1958 and has never been seen since. The Armando Foundation has now granted permission to recreate this work. As a result, all four installations can be shown together for the very first time.
Guest curator Antoon Melissen is responsible for researching the exhibition. The contemporary artists participating in the exhibition were selected by Stedelijk Museum Schiedam. Their combined works will create a new context for Armando’s rarely shown installations and show how, even sixty years on, the Nul Group’s radical ideas are still surprisingly relevant.
Untitled, 1958
At the end of the 1950s, the Nul artists distanced themselves from traditional artists’ materials and started working with more industrial alternatives. For this first installation, Armando collaborated with a paint manufacturer andintroduced his signature ‘Armando red’, a colour that would play an important role in his work during the years the Nul Group was active as a collective (1961–1965).
Armando, Autobandenwand, (Car Tyre Wall) 1962, Car tyres (Goodyear), variable dimensions, Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands. Acquired with the support of the BankGiro Loterij, c/o Pictoright Amsterdam, 2026, photo Marjon Gemmeke
Untitled, 1962 (Autobandenwand / Car Tyre Wall)
The Autobandenwand (1962), i.e. ‘car tyre wall’, is a wall-filling composition consisting of identical, industrial car tyres. By removing the tyres from their usual context, Armando elevated them to the level of art. Showcasing the beauty of everyday life, the installation highlights the artist’s fascination for mundane, mechanical objects while also zooming in on the Nul artists’ interest in repetition and serial structures.
Armando, Zwart water, (Black Water) 1964, mixed technique, variable dimensions, Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands. Acquired with the support of the BankGiro Loterij, c/o Pictoright Amsterdam 2026, photo Marjon Gemmeke
Zwart water (Black Water), 1964
This installation by Armando evolved after a visit to a paint factory together with fellow Nul artists Henk Peeters and Jan Schoonhoven. At this factory he spotted large tanks filled with black paint, which inspired him to create this work. In this same location he also saw the paint drums he would use for the other installation he created that year.
The work is a typical Nul artwork as it makes the spectator aware that the ‘ordinary everyday’ can be extraordinary. At the same time the work also has a mystical quality. By suggesting the water is unfathomably deep and through the use of mysterious lighting, Armando’s Black Water not merely represents an ‘object’, but creates a physical experience as well.
Armando, 5 rode en 5 zwarte vaten, (5 Red Drums and 5 Black Drums), 1964, 200-litre drums, painted red and black, 10 pieces, Collection Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands. Acquired with the support of the BankGiro Loterij, c/o Pictoright Amsterdam 2026, photo Marjon Gemmeke
Rode vaten, zwarte vaten, (Red Drums, Black Drums), 1964
Repetitive use of identical, industrially produced objects, in this case red and black drums, is typical for the Nul Group. Even though the artists wanted to express themselves in a visual language that was as objective as possible, Armando’s choice for steel drums, barbed wire, steel drums, and sheets of metal provided the work with a sharp edge.
In his later work, Armando let go of this quest for neutrality and instead started to expressly focus on themes like power, violence, and memory. In retrospect, the materials he used during his Nul period, appear to be an early harbinger of this shift.
Contemporary art in the spirit of Nul
Today, Armando’s radical approach remains surprisingly topical. His work resonates strongly with a new generation of artists who create spatial, multisensory installations. Stedelijk Museum Schiedam therefore decided to take Armando’s Nul installations as the point of departure for an exhibition in which Nul art engages in a dialogue with contemporary art.
The exhibition shows how contemporary artists who work with light, movement, and space, are building on a long-standing tradition. At the same time, the museum also places Armando’s installations in a contemporary context to demonstrate that their power of expression has remained completely intact.
Director Anne de Haij selected two artists and an art collective and asked them to immerse themselves in Armando’s Nul period and choose a single work from their own oeuvre that tied in with it. They are Rotterdam artist Zalán Szakács (1992), The Hague artist Gabey Tjon a Tham (1988), and the Amsterdam art collective Touki Delphine. Their work is presented in a dialogue with Armando’s installations. Szakács is even developing a new installation especially for the exhibition.
Zalán Szakacs, Topia, 2019, Light-installation, 15 min, 10 x 3 m, photo Cristoph Wimmer
Zalán Szakács
Artist and researcher Zalán Szakács explores the relationship between technology, space and human perception. Using light, sound, mist and movement, he invites visitors to look at their surroundings, and themselves, in a different way. Inspired by Armando’s Black Water, Szakács’s new work explores, amongst other things, the meaning of emptiness and the absence of light. In the spirit of the Zero movement, he seeks a zero point: a fleeting moment in which form, space and perception converge.
Gabey Tjon a Tham, Red Horizon, 2014, multimedia installation, variable dimensions, photo Maurice Tjon a Tham
Gabey Tjon a Tham
The multimedia installations of artist Gabey Tjon a Tham are multisensory environments in which moving machines, light, and sound come together. At Stedelijk Museum Schiedam she is presenting an adapted version of Red Horizon, an installation featuring fifteen moving double pendulums that together create a dynamic interplay of light and sound. These movements leave afterimages on the retina, causing new shapes to appear. Due to her research into light, movement, and perception, Tjon a Tham feels a close connection to the principles of the Nul movement, including its anti-pictorial stance.
Touki Delphine, Relay, 2023, Relays on corrugated steel, 40 min, 12 x 4 m, Concept: Touki Delphine, Installation design: John van Oostrum, Composition: Bo Koek, Rik Elstgeest, Chris Doyle, Design advice: Theun Mosk, photo Céline Pignet
Touki Delphine
Touki Delphine, a collective of musicians, performers and visual artists, creates monumental light and sound installations from discarded industrial materials. Through immersive musical experiences, the artists explore the relationship between people, nature and technology. In their audiovisual installation RELAY, they use 1,848 relays to generate rhythm and harmony. By transforming industrial waste materials into a poetic installation, Touki Delphine aligns with the material-based approach of the Nul artists, and in particular with Armando, for whom industrial materials formed an essential part of his work.