Young Heritage: Hip-Hop Culture in Heerlen
15 August 2025 to 31 January 2026
What do we actually preserve as heritage? With the new programme line Young Heritage, SCHUNCK explores the traces of youth culture in Heerlen. The first edition, focusing on Heerlen’s hip-hop scene, opens during IBE 2025 and features work by photographer Tyson Ernste.
Where
SCHUNCK Glaspaleis
Price
Vrije toegang
What does a stack of cassette tapes, a pair of worn-out sneakers, or a flyer from the early 2000s say about a city? With Young Heritage, SCHUNCK launches a new series of presentations that give objects from Heerlen’s youth culture a place in the museum. The first edition opens on 15 August and focuses on the city’s hip-hop scene, with photographer Tyson Ernste at its heart.
On the vide in the central hall of the Glaspaleis, Tyson showcases objects from his personal archive — records, Polaroids, posters, and other tangible memories from Heerlen’s early hip-hop years. Alongside this, he presents a photography exhibition where street culture, identity, and the search for connection between worlds come together. His journey through Heerlen’s hip-hop scene began at the Glaspaleis, where, as a teenager, he gathered with others to breakdance. Later, his perspective shifted to the camera, which he used to capture his surroundings — first in Heerlen, and later in Indonesia, his other home.
The exhibition follows this trajectory and shows how a subculture like hip-hop permeates personal life stories and urban contexts.
Tyson Ernste (1990, Heerlen)
Tyson is a photographer. He grew up in Heerlen and was part of the city’s first generation of hip-hop enthusiasts in the 1990s. As a teenager, he was active as a breakdancer and found in the local scene a place for expression and community. His work explores personal stories, street culture, and themes such as migration and belonging. Tyson graduated from the University of the Arts Utrecht (HKU).
About Young Heritage
With Young Heritage, SCHUNCK examines how subcultures from the 1980s onward have shaped the collective memory of Heerlen. From punk, hip-hop, and graffiti to skating, street fashion, MySpace, and youth centres: what do we preserve, and why? In a specially designed cabinet on the mezzanine, objects and stories from a specific scene are presented several times a year.
The photography exhibition runs until 26 September 2025, and the cabinet until the end of January 2026. This programme was developed in collaboration with Kool Cult.