Niek Kosten

Centrum voor Heimwee

In the long period between the closure of the coal mine of Waterschei (Genk, BE) in 1987 and the renovation of the site in 2010 the parking lot in front of the mine building was frequently used by truck drivers as a rest stop. The truck drivers, mainly from Turkish origin, could find shops and bars across the street (André Dumontlaan) for food, a shower and social contact. On August 30th, 2004 the city of Genk closed the parking lot with a nightly action and wrote out a prohibition for all trucks in the vicinity of the parking lot.

Nowadays the streets suffers from great vacancy: a lot of the shops had to close because of the deplacement of the truckers. From the Centrum voor Heimwee, located in an abandoned house at the André Dumontlaan, graphic designers Stijn Segers and Niek Kosten did research on the concept of heimwee (homesickness), searched for connections with the neighbourhood to collect stories, pictures and other archive material from the old parking lot and made plans for the erection of a Monument for the Unknown Trucker on the parking lot.

Commemorating the lost truckers of Waterschei, Segers and Kosten once again closed the parking lot for all traffic. They named this action as Monument for the Unknown Trucker. The parking was closed from Thursday September 13, 00:00 until Friday September 14, 00:00. Thursday September 13 at 19:00 a remembrance ceremony for the lost truckers was held at the blockade in collaboration with the Manifesta 9 Biennal.
🔗 manifesta.org/manifesta-9/
📷 www.hugothomassen.eu (1)