event
Over three sessions, Art & Spatial Praxis invites research collaborators to imagine more equitable, communal, queer, and subversive ways of being and of inhabiting our urban environments. This series is a collaboration between the research group Art & Spatial Praxis and ARIAS.
Drawing on the work of Jamaican writer and philosopher Sylvia Wynter, these weaving stories sessions focus on her concept of the plot as a historical material space, a narrative technology, and an anti-hegemonic practice of being human. Each session will introduce key aspects of Wynter’s thinking and feature an activation led by an invited guest collaborator.
Context
Wynter argues that colonial capitalist systems organise societies and economies, and shape, secure, and enforce a dominant notion of what it means to be human: one based on economic value, possessive whiteness, violence, and separation from nature. This overdetermined genre of the human incentivises us to behave as perpetually productive entrepreneurs, owners, and consumers, while rendering other ways of living deviant or unsustainable.
One of the central mechanisms through which this genre of the human is reproduced is property. Property does not simply organise the ownership of land, resources and objects, such as housing; it shapes our relations to one another, to labour, to our urban environment, and to ourselves. It establishes distinctions between owners and non-owners, determines who can inhabit space securely and who remains precarious, and transforms housing from a social necessity into a speculative asset.
In this second session, we ask: What might a city without property look like? What would it mean to rethink, rather than reform, housing? How would relations between people, labour, and land change if rent and the appropriation of housing were abolished? What forms of organisation could replace landlordism, housing as a commodity, and a speculative housing market?
One of the central mechanisms through which this genre of the human is reproduced is property. Property does not simply organise the ownership of land, resources and objects, such as housing; it shapes our relations to one another, to labour, to our urban environment, and to ourselves. It establishes distinctions between owners and non-owners, determines who can inhabit space securely and who remains precarious, and transforms housing from a social necessity into a speculative asset.
In this second session, we ask: What might a city without property look like? What would it mean to rethink, rather than reform, housing? How would relations between people, labour, and land change if rent and the appropriation of housing were abolished? What forms of organisation could replace landlordism, housing as a commodity, and a speculative housing market?
Session II
For the second session of Abolish the Human, Patricia de Vries will introduce the research group's ongoing work on the plot as a framework for thinking through enclosure, ownership, and alternative forms of social organisation.
The session continues with a lecture by philosopher Daniel Loick, whose work examines the historical and political foundations of property and explores abolitionist approaches to ownership. Drawing on examples ranging from squatting movements to contemporary struggles around housing and land, Loick challenges the assumption that property is a natural or necessary basis for organising society. Instead, he asks how we might cultivate forms of collective life and infrastructures of care that move beyond ownership and possession.
Following the lecture, participants will work in small groups to collectively imagine a city without property. Through a series of prompts, we will explore how housing, land, labour, care, and social relations might be organised differently, and what new forms of assembly, accountability, and collective responsibility such a horizon would require.
This session takes place in a space that experiments with different ways of inhabiting and sharing the city, foregrounding community use over extraction and profit. Together, we will reflect on existing practices that challenge proprietary relations and speculate on how other urban futures might be rehearsed in the present.
All are welcome to join to exchange ideas, learn from one another, and reflect on the theoretical and material manifestations that speak to the plot.
The session continues with a lecture by philosopher Daniel Loick, whose work examines the historical and political foundations of property and explores abolitionist approaches to ownership. Drawing on examples ranging from squatting movements to contemporary struggles around housing and land, Loick challenges the assumption that property is a natural or necessary basis for organising society. Instead, he asks how we might cultivate forms of collective life and infrastructures of care that move beyond ownership and possession.
Following the lecture, participants will work in small groups to collectively imagine a city without property. Through a series of prompts, we will explore how housing, land, labour, care, and social relations might be organised differently, and what new forms of assembly, accountability, and collective responsibility such a horizon would require.
This session takes place in a space that experiments with different ways of inhabiting and sharing the city, foregrounding community use over extraction and profit. Together, we will reflect on existing practices that challenge proprietary relations and speculate on how other urban futures might be rehearsed in the present.
All are welcome to join to exchange ideas, learn from one another, and reflect on the theoretical and material manifestations that speak to the plot.
About
Weaving Stories is a series organised by ARIAS and curated by Nienke Scholts. It invites artist-researchers and research collectives to explore and interrogate a specific research theme across multiple sessions with participants. In a context where opportunities for slow, in-depth exchange are increasingly limited, Weaving Stories provides space to gather around diverse perspectives and approaches to doing research.
Art & Spatial Praxis at Rietveld Sandberg Research focuses on artistic and academic interventions in spatial, institutional, and digital enclosures. Headed by Patricia de Vries and coordinated by Laura Dubourjal, the research group explores the practices of makers and thinkers whose work resonates with Sylvia Wynter’s concept of the plot. It approaches the plot as a methodological framework, asking how artists, activists, and scholars can challenge institutional and capitalist norms to cultivate alternative forms of understanding, being, and social relations.
Daniel Loick is a philosopher and political theorist whose work focuses on critical social theory, political philosophy, and abolitionist thought. His research examines property, law, and institutions, asking how social life might be organised beyond domination, exclusion, and ownership. His recent work explores alternatives to property-based social relations and the possibilities of collective forms of care and responsibility.
Art & Spatial Praxis at Rietveld Sandberg Research focuses on artistic and academic interventions in spatial, institutional, and digital enclosures. Headed by Patricia de Vries and coordinated by Laura Dubourjal, the research group explores the practices of makers and thinkers whose work resonates with Sylvia Wynter’s concept of the plot. It approaches the plot as a methodological framework, asking how artists, activists, and scholars can challenge institutional and capitalist norms to cultivate alternative forms of understanding, being, and social relations.
Daniel Loick is a philosopher and political theorist whose work focuses on critical social theory, political philosophy, and abolitionist thought. His research examines property, law, and institutions, asking how social life might be organised beyond domination, exclusion, and ownership. His recent work explores alternatives to property-based social relations and the possibilities of collective forms of care and responsibility.
