Through installation and performance, Toni Brell examines the exclusions embedded in Central European ceremonial and musical traditions. Practices such as horn-blowing have historically excluded people whose bodies, identities, or positions fall outside dominant cultural frameworks. Through a syntax of gestures, shapes, and characters that reappear and shift over time, Brell develops a poetics of divergence, a counter-language to regimes of normativity. This approach materializes in composite sculptures, often made from ceramic, in which objects are fused together while seams remain visible – traces of tension between tradition and difference. The sculptures operate as props or scores that become activated through performance, structuring gestures, actions, and relations in space. Brell has been artist in residence at Saari Residence (FI), KAOS (BE), and Est-Nord-Est (CA), among others. Recently, their work has been presented in exhibitions and performances at Kunstfort bij Vijfhuizen, De Vishal Haarlem, Kunstcentrum De Ploeg, and at the Sonic Acts Biennial. Since 2023, Brell has taught Narration in Space at Design Academy Eindhoven. Brell lives and works in Amsterdam.
