Group exhibition
03.10–19.12.2025: Moezeum, Rotterdam, NL
OP=OP
In Arabic, the word ‘to consume’ – استهلك (is-tahlaka) – is derived from the root word َهَلَك (halaka) which means to deplete or to annihilate. Therefore, to consume is to enter an energetic relation of exhaustion, driving the resource towards its own annihilation الهلاك (al-halaak).
“OP=OP” on the other hand is a Dutch expression which is often used in shops to advertise that the quantity on offer is limited; what is gone is gone, and won’t come back. It’s gone for good.
The featured artists in this exhibition expose different ways where exhaustion in the broadest sense is used as a tool and method of colonial power and capitalist systems. Here, exhaustion is not just a metaphorical or psychological consequence. It is structural, imposed, and weaponized by systems of domination which exhaust humans amongst other natural resources to the point of annihilation.
OP=OP, the grabbing continues until the supplies run out.
OP=OP, the resources are consumed until depletion.
The resources are copper, land, labour, sleep, culture, and the bodies standing in resistance.
The participating artists are:
Tala Abdalhadi // Diana Al-Halabi // Moses Maerz // Naomi Rincón-Gallardo // Sara Sallam // Firas Shehadeh // Jean Katambayi, Sammy Baloji, Daddy Tshikaya, and Marjolijn Dijkman
Throughout the exhibition period, we will be hosting knowledge and tactic-sharing sessions that present counter-strategies for exhausting these economies of exhaustion through acts of disruption, refusal, and reclamation.
Curated by Hilda Moucharrafieh
Poster design by Chris Sleiman
