output 25 Jun 26
As temperatures outside seem to keep rising, the end of this academic year slowly approaches. Next Wednesday, the graduation exhibition kicks off, and we would love to see you there. Before closing the office for the summer, we wanted to share some reflections on the past year. We have also put together a reading list of texts that accompanied our events over the past year, inviting you to (re)encounter them during the summer break. We wish you a wonderful summer filled with inspiring experiences and look forward to seeing you again after the break. Stay hydrated, and take care of yourselves and each other.
The Art & Spatial Praxis research group has recently been awarded a seedling grant by the Centre of Expertise for Creative Innovation (CoECI) for its forthcoming project Rehearsing Futures: Strategies for Living Otherwise. The project will address the normalisation of far-right political language and framing in social and cultural spaces. It will bring together activist collectives, artists, organisers, and educators to work with performative methods seeking to articulate practices of refusal within cultural and educational spaces in response to these shifts in norms.
As we prepare to gather in the Fall, we have been reading texts that invite us to imagine different futures together, and new (and sometimes unexpected) forms of alliance and solidarity.
As we prepare to gather in the Fall, we have been reading texts that invite us to imagine different futures together, and new (and sometimes unexpected) forms of alliance and solidarity.
“Dirty Hands” (pp. 131–156), from Rednecks and Barbarians by Houria Bouteldja
Introduction to Pirate Care: Acts Against the Criminalization of Solidarity
Between Not Everything and Not Nothing: Cuts Toward Infrastructural Critique, Marina Vishmidt
Materiality Library
This spring the Materiality research group launched the Materiality Library, an open platform and a shared resource that invites all members of the Rietveld community to use it, develop learning methodologies around it and along the way build a shared vision of kinship with the materials of the academy. The Material Library can be found here: materials.rietveldsandberg.nl . Photos of the launch can be found here .
The Material Library expands through intensive workshops called Material Assemblies. This year the first two Material Assemblies took place. For the first edition we followed the material traces of the tree felled on the neighbouring plot of the academy and visited the sawmill of Stadshout ( see the photos here ). That's where we got the tip to read the book In the Circle of Ancient Trees: Our oldest trees and the stories they tell , by Valerie Trouet.
For the second edition we looked at the material infrastructures that underlie the virtual presence and digital affordances of the academy (see the photos here). To accompany the workshop, we read the book A Prehistory of the Cloud by Tung-Hui Hu.
For the second edition we looked at the material infrastructures that underlie the virtual presence and digital affordances of the academy (see the photos here). To accompany the workshop, we read the book A Prehistory of the Cloud by Tung-Hui Hu.
Weaving Stories, Abolish the Human
In the Weaving Stories, Abolish the Human series, the Art & Spatial Praxis research group invites you to imagine more equitable, communal, queer, and subversive ways of being and of inhabiting our urban environments.
Jineolojî and the notion of the free personality
Iliada Charalambous guided the first session in April with readings on the topic of Jineolojî, an ideology originally developed by the Kurdish Women's Freedom Movement. She opened up the conversation focused on the notion of the free personality, a subject formation that seeks to cultivate individuals liberated from the constraints of patriarchy, state oppression, and capitalist modernity. We read these texts:
For the second session, which has been postponed until September , we will read these texts by philosopher Daniel Loick, whose work examines the historical and political foundations of property and explores abolitionist approaches to ownership:
Jineolojî and the notion of the free personality
Iliada Charalambous guided the first session in April with readings on the topic of Jineolojî, an ideology originally developed by the Kurdish Women's Freedom Movement. She opened up the conversation focused on the notion of the free personality, a subject formation that seeks to cultivate individuals liberated from the constraints of patriarchy, state oppression, and capitalist modernity. We read these texts:
The Art of Freedom: A Brief History of the Kurdish Liberation Struggle, Havin Guneser
How to live, what to do, where to start?”– Extract from Öcalan’s 4th manifesto, Abdullah Öcalan
Chapter 12: Jineolojî as the science of woman, Abdullah Öcalan
Chapter 4: Killing And Transforming The Dominant Man, Andrea Wolf Institute of Jineolojî Academy
For the second session, which has been postponed until September , we will read these texts by philosopher Daniel Loick, whose work examines the historical and political foundations of property and explores abolitionist approaches to ownership:
How Material Comes to Matter
In March the Materiality research group celebrated the launch of the publication How Material Comes to Matter - Workshops as sites of collective resistance and reimagination. You can see the online pdf here and photos here .
One of the speakers at the launch was Harriet Morley Rose. During her Technical Fellowship at the Rijksakademie, she investigated the role ecological sustainability played in technical creative workshops. Her publication Waste Not, Want Not: An Incomplete Manual for Artists, Technicians and Workshops is the outcome of this research. Read more on the website of metropolis m .
One of the speakers at the launch was Harriet Morley Rose. During her Technical Fellowship at the Rijksakademie, she investigated the role ecological sustainability played in technical creative workshops. Her publication Waste Not, Want Not: An Incomplete Manual for Artists, Technicians and Workshops is the outcome of this research. Read more on the website of metropolis m .
Cosmology of the Spirit
The Critical Inquiry research group hosted a small-scale reading workshop dedicated to Evald Ilyenkov’s Cosmology of the Spirit, a self-described "philosophical-poetic phantasmagoria" written in the 1950s. Organised by research intern Carlos Drexhage, the workshop examined Ilyenkov’s highly speculative investigation into the place of human thought and the idea of communism in the natural-historical evolution of the cosmos. You can read the text here.
Podcast & movie tips
Podcast: Fela Kuti, Fear no name, Higher Ground
A wonderfully narrated series, inviting us to ask: In a world that’s on fire, what is the role of art? What can music actually…do? Can a song save a life? Change a law? Topple a president? Get you killed?
Movie: The Watermelon Woman, 1996 film by Cheryl Dunye
Rediscover this classic for it's 30th anniversary, back in the movies!
Leftbank & LAB111 present Fragile Traces: Iranian Experimental Shorts
Persepolis (4K Restoration), film by Marjane Satrapi
Revisit this radical film, in honour Satrapi's recent passing. The film strongly continues to resonate with today's world and remains a timeless exploration of identity, resilience, and freedom.
A wonderfully narrated series, inviting us to ask: In a world that’s on fire, what is the role of art? What can music actually…do? Can a song save a life? Change a law? Topple a president? Get you killed?
Movie: The Watermelon Woman, 1996 film by Cheryl Dunye
Rediscover this classic for it's 30th anniversary, back in the movies!
Leftbank & LAB111 present Fragile Traces: Iranian Experimental Shorts
Persepolis (4K Restoration), film by Marjane Satrapi
Revisit this radical film, in honour Satrapi's recent passing. The film strongly continues to resonate with today's world and remains a timeless exploration of identity, resilience, and freedom.