During my education as a Visual Arts & Design teacher, I participated in the Ik Zie, Ik Zie project by artist Herman van Hoogdalem to learn how to portray people in the Odensehuis. The Odensehuis is a walk-in nursing home for people with beginning dementia. After I came into contact with the ‘Gedachtenkamer’, the subject of elderly care never left me while curiosity arose about what the role of art meant for this. The project made me realize that this collaboration is cross-disciplinary: the interdisciplinary method that was applied brought about a new perspective in which the art and care sectors positively complement each other.

Last year, I joined DeMensplek project in which informal carers and caregivers of ’t Blauwbörgje, artists, and researchers developed a vision of a place where dementia as a label does not exist, in which protocols are no longer walls, in which the walls of the institutions become permeable.