citylikeyou — The Old Aquarium — Amsterdam by Popel Coumou

Since I was a child I always loved to go to the aquarium in Artis. This mysterious world that we will never really get to know makes me wonder and raises questions. I like this mysterious world. It’s a place to relax and think things over.

Website
artis.nl

Address
The Old Aquarium, 38-40 Plantage Kerklaan, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Photographer

Current city: Amsterdam

popelcoumou.nl

Popel Coumou lives and works in Amsterdam and studied photography at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy. Her work consists out of analog photographs of collaged spaces that hint at human presence. Through her use of lighting she transforms the collages into 3 dimensional spaces that seem both natural and unhinged.

More Places in Amsterdam 100

Amsterdam / Museum

It's a very small museum in the Hermitage about art made by outsiders. It's also known as 'Art Brut', a name given to it in 1972 by French artist Jean Dubuffet. It simply means that it is art made by people that don't fit in the normal life structure that humans suppose to have. Which can mean that the art is made by people who are in jail, who are ill, have a mental dissability or another way of not fitting into the community. The exhibitions are quite small, so it takes you just around an hour. And the hermitage has a nice canal view.

Amsterdam / Bar

This place has the best handpicked natural wines and great, great food. Lovely, friendly and helpful staff. You can easily sit here for hours, have a bite once in a while and try great wines. An absolute must to visit.

Amsterdam / Bakery

This place has, beside the excellent pastry, the best shrimp croquettes in town.

Amsterdam / Place

Just a fantastic spot on the edge of the city. Its connection of the Amsterdam-Rijn Canal to the IJ, Amsterdam’s big open water, that was once part of the North Sea, but now dammed in by the Dutch. Sometimes it’s just a relief to leave the prettiness and the cuteness of the Amsterdam canals behind and experience some space. Few people come out here and in summertime it’s just a delightful spot to have a picnic and watch the boats come in.

Amsterdam / School

Surrounded by the growing business area of Amsterdam Zuid, this modernist historic monument from the 60's oozes freedom. The clash of strict, grey, practical architecture of Gerrit Rietveld with the chaotic, colourful, anarchic bustle of art students working in these spaces is amazing. The 5 years I spend here as a student changed my life and shaped me to a great extend to who I am today. Now, temporarily walking these corridors again as a guest teacher, I realise how much I had missed this place since graduating 8 years ago. This is not a common art school. It's a family, a movement with a very personal and radical approach. Many students coming for a temporary exchange end up staying, because after wandering through this twisted Mondrian painting you will never be the same…