Practicum Artium: Silver Endings — Thinking Through Making

Practicum Artium

Practicum Artium is a joint programme by Leiden University and Royal Academy of Art, that offers talented students from Leiden University the opportunity to develop artistic perspectives and skills through drawing, filmmaking, painting, or photography during one academic year at KABK.

To finalize the Practicum Artium courses we organize a three-day exhibition in the Galleries and Cinema of the KABK. This year's 2026 exhibition opens on Thursday 21st of May at 17:30 at the reception hall in front of the Service Desk.

Silver Endings will stay open on Friday 22nd of May and Saturday 23rd of May during KABK’s opening hours, with great help and support from KABK’s Service Desk team, our facilities and production department.

The visual and graphic design of the exhibition is made by Khulan Erdenepurev, the programme is coordinated by Stéphane Blokhuis. The incredible team of tutors consists of Tanja Smit, Iztok Klančar, Nadine Stijns and Thijs Wieman.

Silver Endings: thinking through making also refers to the temporary ending of the current set up of the Practicum Artium programme. Where something ends, something new can begin. We are looking forward to welcoming you the 21st, 22nd and 23rd of May 2026.

PA Painting: Crafting meaning with Colour, Tanja Smit

"Welcome to the exhibition!

It shows the wonderful result of the last edition of the PA painting course for the time being: the individual painting projects that the students created at the end of the course. The paintings explore their personal fascinations through painting, using the knowledge and experience they have acquired at the KABK this year. They come in a rich variety, also in terms of form and style.

The talented students give us a glimpse into their inner worlds, which makes this exhibition highly personal, and at the same time very universal and recognizable. The paintings tell about nostalgia for a safety and clarity once experienced; the lack of real contact between individuals in groups; feelings of claustrophobia; the experience of a gender transition; memories of physical intimacy and distorted realities.

They also tell us about the sense of gaps, for instance between rich and poor, mind and body. But most of all they show us wonderful paintings, in which the skills, learned during the course, are visible. All together they provide an intriguing view of our times."

PA Film in Practice, Iztok Klančar

"Anecdotal — Challenging — Collaborative — Colourful — Composed — Conscious — Divine — Embodied — Empathetic — Escapist — Essayistic — Experimental — Fictitious — Internal — Layered — Masochist — Metaphysical — Mind–altering — Mundane — Obsessive — Ongoing — Performative — Personal — Phantasmical — Poetic — Public — Ritualistic — Scenic — Sonic — Swell"

PA Drawing Dimensions, Thijs Wieman

"This exhibition marks the conclusion of a year in which students explored diverse techniques, materials and methodologies, within the discipline of drawing. Their open-minded approach allowed them to engage in independent artistic research. They developed an individual vision of their drawing practice, driven by curiosity that reached beyond their comfort zones and guided by their personal fascinations. Within a self-chosen theme, they explored related forms and working methods.

The result is a diverse collection of works, layered in both material and meaning. Imagination, contemporary themes, science, religion, the body, the mind and materiality take center stage across the senses, where the personal touches the universal."

PA Photography; Visual Conversations, Nadine Stijns

"Students this year are drawn to experimental approaches in photography through analogue techniques and material-based processes. Their explorations range from interventions during image-making itself, such as deliberate overexposure, and photographing through physical filters, as well as transferring images onto clay and making cyanotypes.

Alongside these material explorations, many projects engage with the insider–outsider perspective of the photographer in relation to belonging. Topics such as living off-season in a city known for summer tourism, reconnecting to a grandfather’s hometown, or reflecting on the emotional value of objects connected to a study abroad, are explored.

We always encourage our students to look beyond the obvious, and this mindset is clearly reflected in how the students approach their subjects. I’m incredibly proud of the work and dedication the Photography class of 2026 has demonstrated."

Participants:

PA Drawing Dimensions:

Doğa Aykol, Bella Cony Dantas Moraal, Zoë Daudey, Esra Gun, Noah Marcus, Aline Rihm, Anouk Sparwasser, Athos Voutsakis, Leo Knur, Noa van Gijlswijk, Yana Fieggen, Mahi Bakhtiari

PA Painting: Crafting meaning with Colour

Sofya Baranova, Sem Duijnisveld, Durdane Sahin, Emilia Schmidt, Colin Schouten, Elza Thio, Saskia Türk, Mies van Riel, Raquel Beijer

PA Photography; Visual Conversations

Lucas Bohusch, Sandy Cheung, Benoy Dřenzla, Marijke Hopen Alfarnes, Panni Kakuk, Suhotra Kokkula, Mateusz Kolasiński, Mirjam Liebl, Kristína Malá, Clea Menget, Alec Phillips, Carmen Rico Fernández, Anthe Schat, Chara Vasileiou

Practicum Artium Film in Practice:

Ainhoa Casero De Marsily, Ninn Casselryd De Marsily, Anna Chatzioti, Indi De Mol, Anouk van Frankfoort, Shahinda Hammoud, Yonis Haroon, Petra Knuth, Valentin Reichel, Borja Sanchez De Prado, Elifnaz Tahhuşoğlu, Laura Tonso, Mira Weidner