Ronnie van Hout is a bold and playful multimedia artist whose aesthetic reflects an ongoing engagement with the uncanny. Having honed a distinctive style referred to as ‘existential absurdism’, van Hout’s sculptural installations, videos and text works evoke constructed worlds that are simultaneously humorous, unsettling and nostalgic. Throughout his career, the artist has treated his own body as subject and object, using moulds and resin to create various doppelgangers that play with ideas of the self, while avoiding self-portraiture or narcissism. Many of his works explore a fascination with the figure of the ‘outsider’ ­– aliens, robots, gurus and cult leaders – interrogating the psychology of uneven power relationships while setting up situations in which the audience’s gaze is returned.