Piknik Horrifik (12+)

Terrifying, mysterious and yet irresistibly beautiful 'The Garden of Earthly Delights' is Hieronymus Bosch’s most fascinating painting. Bosch visualizes his ideas about humankind: created in God’s image, expelled from paradise, inquisitive and hedonistic by nature and doomed to be swallowed up by the jaws of hell. A nightmarish vision designed to encourage man to lead a virtuous life. Vife hundred years later this painting is still very topical.

Piknik Horrifik is all about privation and abundance. About privation that leads to hunger and about the decadent superabundance that characterizes modern-day Western society. Whereas people used to gorge themselves when times were good to compensate for the lean years, these days we no longer know the meaning of scarcity. The abundance of food is seemingly endless and wasted with abandon. But when will our consciences begin to gnaw? And what if the tide turns? 

Laika transforms a desolate spot into one of supreme bliss where the spectator is tempted by heavenly pleasures. That idyll then transforms into a cornucopian garden, after which the visitor is carried off on an ‘apocalyptic picnic’. Piknik Horrifik confounds us with an exuberant abundance – the main characteristic of Bosch’s oeuvre: lots of characters, lots of action, lots of images and copious quantities of food and drink …