club culture / education / film / music / writing / contact
2023
Tags: art, education, research
In April 2023 I started as head of the Fine Art department at AKI Academy of Art & Design in Enschede. The AKI - Academie voor Kunst en Industrie (academy for art and industry) - was founded in 1949 in order to catch up on the backlog in Twente in terms of art, culture and higher education and to provide designers for the regional textile industry. Stedelijk Museum director Willem Sandberg compiled a list of designers among which Aldo van Eyck and Joop Hardy were appointed as teachers. Dirk de Leeuw, from the Institute for Applied Arts Education (the current Gerrit Rietveld Academie), was the first director.
From 1968-1981 Joop Hardy directed the AKI, and he transformed it into a working community where students were able to have their say and had more freedom. In the early 1970s, there were programmes called environment, communication and emotion. Students’ self-development was a key aspect. Hardy opposed the regulations of the government. In 1981 he was succeeded by Sipke Huismans.
During the 1970s, the AKI was an artistic haven where there was also much attention for multimedia, film and theatre. Students collaborated and set up initiatives such as the graphic centre De Ark and the Enschede School, in part because of the school’s isolation. The textile industry of Twente disappeared. The academy came under pressure during the eighties due to the government’s minimum requirement of 600 students. Eventually it merged with the schools of Arnhem and Zwolle into ArtEZ, located at the Twente University campus.
Working at what was once the most anarchist art academy in the Netherlands, founded in 1949 with the help of one of my heroes Willem Sandberg, was a dream job. Here I could bring my experience with designing and developing pedagogical programmes based on collective creativity, mutual aid and solidarity. Connect the academy to international communities and organisations centering climate justice in art education. And bring the collective joy of club culture to create new celebrations of students.
Unfortunately already in June 2023, after 16 days, I left the AKI. Our expectations turned out to be insufficiently aligned. This led to us parting ways.
In spite of my short tenure in Enschede I have enjoyed working with the staff and students immensely, and I wish them good luck in the future.
Art education remains a vital part of my life. I continue teaching, focusing on postcapitalism, collective creativity and climate justice.