Visiting Anne Imhof’s exhibition YOUTH is a bewildering experience. On the one hand, it triggers a disturbing and disorienting feeling, and on the other hand, it evokes a peculiar sense of at-homeness. I have been here before, I know my way around here—this thought comes to mind while meandering through the 1,100-meter square labyrinth Imhof had built in the basement gallery of the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, a space that usually houses the museum’s permanent collection.

This fundamental tension between the feeling of home and the feeling of estrangement is at the heart of the labyrinthine exhibition, a genre that has its roots in the 1930s Surrealist shows and that reached its apex in Europe in the 1960s. Historically, the labyrinthine exhibition marked the transition from the traditional exhibitionary format of visual display toward dynamic and participatory forms. The visitor in the labyrinthine exhibition is not just a passive spectator...

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