OPEN CALL: 'Tower of Babel' via Het Bijbels Museum and Stedelijk Museum Breda

Via: Het Bijbels Museum and Stedelijk Museum Breda
Deadline: 14 December 2025, 23.59 hrs
More info: www.bijbelsmuseum.nl

'Once upon a time, the whole earth spoke a single language.'

Het Bijbels Museum and Stedelijk Museum Breda invite you to take note of the Open Call Tower of Babel. With this open call, we invite artists to submit works on the theme of the Tower of Babel. A selection of at least 20 works will be exhibited in the Tower of Babel exhibition at Stedelijk Museum Breda from 21 November 2026 to 17 May 2027.

Even if you have never read the Bible, you have probably heard of this story. Many people know Pieter Brueghel’s magnificent paintings of the tower, on display in Rotterdam. The central themes of the story - humanity’s spread across the earth and the origin of language - also appear in other cultures and religions. Similar stories can be found in Greek mythology, Polish folklore, and among the traditions of peoples in China, India, and Indonesia. In Islam, there is a parallel tale in which Pharaoh builds a tower to defy the God of Moses.

The tower also appears in our language, in expressions such as 'Babylonian confusion of tongues' (when no one understands each other) and 'to build a Tower of Babel' (to take on an ambitious project that cannot be completed). The multiplicity of voices and the confusion of speech in society remain as relevant today as in the ancient story of the Tower of Babel.

This open call focuses on that story - and more specifically, on the theme of language in the broadest sense of the word. Think, for instance, of AI, body language, youth slang, visual language, sign language, and more. We warmly invite you to participate in this Open Call.

Participation
The open call will result in a group exhibition Tower of Babel at Stedelijk Museum Breda.
Have you created a work that relates to this theme, or do you have a plan to interpret - in your own way and in an artistic form of your choice - the above-mentioned theme of language in the broadest sense as drawn from the myth of the Tower of Babel or similar stories from other cultures? If so, we invite you to apply.