Antony Gormley
Geestgrond

This exhibition, curated by Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, digs into the ground and grain of Antony Gormley’s work, but also in the collections of the museum and into the layered soil of our shared visual and material culture. What is unearthed is not just sculpture, but a field of feeling, sensing, and being — rooted and revealed.

In Geestgrond, Antony Gormley’s sculptural practice is not enclosed within the space of a single exhibition. It is diffused, extended, and absorbed into the very structure and logic of the museum. His work acts neither as a visitor or guest, but as a material condition of its own porosity. The exhibition does not begin at the gallery door, nor does it end within it. Instead, it circulates: across rooftops and thresholds, in front of the museum and into the streets of Antwerp, through the permanent collection and into the recesses of individual attention. 

The title Geestgrond refers to a specific landform: a raised, fertile terrain shaped by glacial movement during the Ice Age, where heather thrives. But it also resonates beyond geology. Geest means soul or spirit; grond, earth or ground. It is a word in which Revelation rises from Root, and where the sediment of time carries the breath of presence.

In the KMSKA, works by Antony Gormley are placed among historical pieces. They act as if they themselves were visitors, rather than interventions. Their porous, diagrammatic bodies trace spatial relationships and emotional atmospheres. A figure might linger beside a Flemish devotional painting or lean toward a wall in solitary meditation. Historical works also appear in Gormley’s galleries - not as anchors, but as quiet acts of dialogue. 

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