1,311 Diamonds (2026)
Installation View: “State of Wander: Towards Environmental Restoration,” Paleis Het Loo, Apeldoorn, NL April 16 – September 27, 2026
Curated by Anna Bitkina
What are our connections to and what is Paleis Het Loo’s relationship to water, to breath, the deep sea, slavery, and ongoing legacies of colonial violence?
About 1311 Diamonds
Berrigan weaves together material metaphors, reparative practices, and the history of Paleis Het Loo with its ties to marine mercantilism and the Transatlantic slave trade—a source of systemic racism and intergenerational trauma. Amid climate crisis and social reckonings, the work tends to submerged oceanic histories that continue to shape the palace and our unequal relationships to nature.
The ocean imbues several artistic gestures. The palace’s marble, formed by microscopic sea creatures, links architecture to marine life and the planet’s atmospheric cycles. Indigo-dyed textiles evoke both aquatic depth and a link between the royal family and slavery, while the shipwrecked shells resound the breathing practices of a reparative swim school led by and for BIPOC communities. The installation frames the ocean as a nexus of extraction and memory—as well as a source of breath and connection.
