Maarten Schuurman is a multidisciplinary artist whose work ranges from site-specific interventions to object based installations. His practice employs a variety of media including video, screen print, sculpture, installation, and programming; referencing aspects of gaming culture, (online) identity and conceptual traditions.

Schuurman draws inspriration from contemporary gaming culture. Fascinated by the game not only as a ritual (Johan Huizinga) but also as a set of algorithmic and action based systems, social structures and visual languages. This is true for his object based installations that function as autonomous invironments. With these installations Schuurman carefully conducts and positions his public through the works presented. Regarding the white space as a sandbox game where the player is free to roam.

His recent work All the things you could be by now (Square Dance Revolution) explores the act of reenacting a performance. In order to reenact Bruce Nauman's 1967 Square Dance (Dance or Exercise on the Perimeter of a Square) Schuurman translated Nauman's movements to machine code and built an arcade machine in order to conduct his movements. The machine orchestrates and monitors the operator, step-by-step, move-by-move. Aside from being a tool for Schuurman the machine also is open for the public to use, awarding the performance and keeping a score list.

In his textile works Schuurman explores the screenprinting technique in a mathematical manner. It can best be described as making moves on a playfield. Reacting on former decisions and creating new strategies, sometimes playing against himself and sometimes working more constructive in a coorporative mode. In this way Maarten takes on a painterly approach in creating compositions, which is in contrast with the traditional structured process of screenprinting.

In a continuing playfull manner Maarten Schuurman explores the artistic practise by collaboration, frequently working together with Esther Brakenhoff. When collaborating both artists act as participants in a multiplayer game, occasionally working coorporative as a team counteracting authorship. These project are not a simple add up of individual artistic inputs.but more an exercise in communication. With their ongoing project Shift Operation Esther Brakenhoff and Maarten Schuurman invite other artist in this research. Setting up a temporary artist collective and exploring ways of collaborating by sharing thoughts, ideas and space.

Recent exhibitions include his first solo exhibition Binary Galaxies at Corridor Project Space, Amsterdam (NL), 2020; Shift Operation / Tokyo Workflow, Cave Gallery, Tokyo (JP), 2020; 4 Cultures Festival, Lodz (PL), 2019; C&H gallery, Amsterdam (NL), 2018; Supermarket Independent Art Fair, Stockholm (SE), 2018; #nfcdab (Near-Field Communication Digital Art Biennale), 2018; W139, Amsterdam (NL), 2017; Paleis van Mieris, Amsterdam (NL), 2017; Hacking Habitat, Utrecht (NL), 2016; Citadel'Arte, Diest (BE), 2016