M HKA Ensembles

° 1963

Lives in Amsterdam (), born in New York (US).

Emily Kocken is artist and writer. Her debut novel Witte vlag (2013) was nominated for the Academica Literature Prize 2014. She received a fellowship by the Dutch Foundation of Literature to write De kuur. Emily researches the intersubjective creating multidisciplinary performative installations. Her methodology contains conceptual and situationist elements, evoking chance to enter carefully designed zones through an eclectic system rooted in mystic pagan traditions. Born in New York, she moved with her family to the Netherlands at the age of seven. She received a rich training in the academic field, studying music, philosophy, theatre, film and writing. For more than a decade she taught music, theatre and film at different high schools. After a car accident in 2000 she quit her teaching job and dedicated herself solely to her art practice, developing her work via interdisciplinary collaborations and solo projects, supported by several Dutch foundations for the arts. By measuring residues of energy deriving from personal histories and particular places, she creates visual and emotional narratives that serve as new sources, blurring the fine lines of (non)fiction. She often involves communities—peer groups—in the process.