Klasien van de Zandschulp

Klasien van de Zandschulp is an interactive artist and creative director of studio affect lab. Critically acclaimed for her story-driven and immersive experiences, she incorporates embodied and movement-based elements with a playful sensibility, weaving unexpected and intimate moments into immersive experiences. She won the IDFA Immersive Non-Fiction award and was appointed fellow at Sundance New Frontier Story Lab. With her work at affect lab she won the Dutch Design Award and was twice nominated for a Golden Calf at the Netherlands Film Festival.

How can embodied interaction, movement, and real-time data create spaces for connection? In this talk, Klasien van de Zandschulp shares her work with studio affect lab into how to design for complex stories of grief, human-nature relationships, and what it means to belong in an increasingly digitised world. Throughout the talk, she connects her background as a farmer to her practice as an immersive artist, revealing unexpected links between land, bodies, and technology.

From waiting_for_cows - where the biometric data of dairy cows shapes an interactive film - to Requiem for the Impossible, an immersive live performance about three missing sailors at sea, these projects treat the audience's bodies, phones, and emotions as storytelling material. Hot Flash Dance Clash and Bleeding Into the Metaverse further explore how movement-based play can open conversations around gender, embodiment, and inclusivity of digital spaces.