good praxis / club culture / education / film / music / writing / about / contact
2025
Tags: art, design, education, Rotterdam, technology
We’re participating in Compos(t)ing, a Regenerative Creative Practice Symposium, at Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam on 10 April 2025.
Willem de Kooning Academy, HKU University of the Arts Utrecht, Academy of Theatre and Dance Amsterdam AHK, CARADT Centre of Applied Research for Art, Design and Technology Avans, and Nieuwe Instituut organise a symposium on the current flows and obstacles in regenerative arts and design. A wide range of creative practices, realised processes, proofs-of-concept, works-in-progress, developed artworks, products and services will be presented by their creators and discussed in moderated groups of participants.
This symposium responds to the urgent need to foster a regenerative culture and economy in which human and more-than-human life can flourish. The aim is to develop a collective understanding of the common characteristics of regenerative practice and how these can work across scales, locations and disciplines. What are the elephants in the room? Which relationships - in education, creative practices and broader systems - need to be broken, and which revitalised? Art and design practices, with their aesthetic, material, political and transformative qualities and sensibilities, have a vital contribution to make here.
Discussions will focus on three interwoven themes: 1. Creative Practices; 2. Regenerative Economies/Human-Inclusive Ecosystems; and 3. Education/Didactics.
Programme
09:00 – 09:30 Registration & coffee
09:30 – 09:50 Embodied Start; an embodied experience led by Anthony Heidweiller & Jay-J Taukave
09:50 – 10:00 Opening by Nieuwe Instituut, Willem de Kooning Academy and moderator Shailoh Phillips
10:00 – 11:00 Plenary Conversations with representatives from collaborating institutions to explore what regeneration means to them, their respective practices and institutions. Speakers include Una Henry, dean of WdKA, Anke JongeJan, senior lecturer and researcher at School of Design HKU, Laura Cull Ó Maoilearca, professor at ATD, Annemarie Piscaer, researcher and lecturer of CARADT, Delfina Fantini van Ditmar, professor at CARADT and Klaas Kuitenbrouwer, senior researcher at Nieuwe Instituut and director of the Zoönomic Institute.
11:15 – 12:45 Workgroups Discussion Set 1:
1A. Belonging Matters by Willemien Ippel (The Linen Project) and Irene Fortuyn (Hand & Land)
1B. Gleaners and the Worms (outdoor workgroup) by Emilie Gallier, Nienke Terpsma and Nina Boas (ATD)
1C. Oyster Heaven & Regenerative Loops by George Birch
1D. Financing Ecological Recovery through Houses for Humans by Marcel Heskes (De Kleverbergh) and Selçuk Balamir
1E. Practising Living Systems part 1 (Students) by Judith van den Boom (Central Saint Martins UAL) and Risk Hazekamp (CARADT)
1F. Facing the Elephant in the (Class)Room by Anke Jongejan (HKU Design) and Henrike Gootjes (ArtEZ University of the Arts)
1G. Cross-Pollination and Collective Action by Wander Eikelboom and Bas van den Hurk, (CARADT) and Juha van ‘t Zelfde (ATD)
12:45 – 13:45 Lunch break
14:00 – 15:30 Workgroups Discussion Set 2
2A. Permacomputing by Aymeric Mansoux and Loes Bogers (WdKA)
2B. Gardening Tactics (outdoor workgroup) by Martijn van Gessel (Green Autonomous Zone HKU), Jonmar van Vlijmen (De Onkruidenier), and Thom Bindels (Amper Design)
2C. Beyond Sustainability by Shivant Jhagroe (Leiden University)
2D. Calibrating the New Store Regenerative Label by Klaas Kuitenbrouwer (Nieuwe Instituut)
2E. Practicing Living Systems part 2 (Educators) by Judith van den Boom (Central Saint Martins UAL)
2F. Living Material Practice by Michaela Davidová (CARADT), Kas Houthuijs and Honey Jones-Hughes (WdKA) and Shirley Niemans (BioLab HKU)
2G. Wild Pedagogies: Being at Home in the World (outdoor workgroup) by Ruben Jacobs (HKU Art and Economics) and Annemarie Piscaer (CARADT)
15:30-15:50: Coffee Break
15:50 – 16:35 Compos(t)ing Session. A dynamic, distributed and collective conversation following a simple format, to help to connect and digest experiences and insights from the programme.
16:50 – 17:20 Reflection by Keynote Speaker Estelle Zhong Mengual. In her new book, Leren Kijken, Estelle proposes new ways of looking at the representation of the living world in art, drawing on the tools of environmental humanities and the most contemporary natural sciences. In her closing session, she will introduce the key perspectives of her work and use them to reflect on the conversations she has engaged in throughout the day.
17:20 – 17:35 Embodied End. An embodied experience lead by Anthony Heidweiller & Jay-J Taukave
17:45 Close
https://nieuweinstituut.nl/en/events/compost-t-ing?ref=goodprax.is