Aarden in de Polder - Exhibition opening on Saturday, 27 September

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Save the date: Exhibition opening on Saturday, 27 September.27 September–16 November 2025 Casco Art Institute: Working for the CommonsLange Nieuwstraat 7, 3512 PA Utrecht Scroll down for public program ⬇ From Casco's website: To land again, to find ground—not only beneath our feet, but within. Where do we truly live? After leaving, drifting, or being pulled away—how do we return? Casco Art Institute: Working for the Commons is pleased to announce its 2025 Autumn artistic program, Rerooting in the Polder, an exhibition by Frisian artist and long-term Casco collaborator Wapke Feenstra.

Summer and early autumn 2025

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Aarden in de Polder at Casco Art Institute, UtrechtWith Aarden in de Polder (Rerooting in the Polder) Wapke’s long-standing engagement turns toward the Dutch landscape, offering particular attention to the distinctive form of the polders: flat, low-lying tracts of land (re)claimed from the sea, lakes, or rivers, made agriculturally productive and protected by dikes, and maintained through an intricate network of canals, pumping stations, and drainage systems. Wapke has spent several decades investigating the ecologies of land - its physical, mental, and social dimensions - by tapping into local knowledges and engaging with people and the everyday.

2025 Lammas Land Haystack

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In 2025 we are meeting again on Saturday 28th June on the Walthamstow Marshes in east London to be close to the land, honour Lammas and common land, learn how to scythe, find and meet medicinal plants, make hay and a haystack, and generally celebrate late June on this public land, which holds many layers and histories beyond the current public park use. Find all the information about the day ,and how to get there here.

Summer 2025 Newsletter

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Rural Relations Writing Club Rural Relations Writing Club is a slow-growing series of writing workshops exploring rural life, memory, and imagination. We gather to write, drawing from memory, imagination, and rural practice. Open to anyone curious about rural storytelling in all its forms—no writing experience needed. Each session centres on a theme: kinship, grief, or harvest. Initiated and organised by Ioana from Seasonal Neighbours in collaboration with Myvillages. Every first Wednesday of the month and 🥣 Dinner includedin Rotterdam Zuid (5 min from Maashaven/Rotterdam)8 spots each session & sign up here: writing.

Unfreeze Your Brain Mini Festival

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SAVE THE DATE ! Kathrin from Myvillages and Bianca Orboi – are organising a two-day interdisciplinary, interspecies Mini-Festival UNFREEZE YOUR BRAIN at Alanus University in Alfter near Bonn. The programme has three main strands: art, economy and land, and contributors include Kompost Ensemble, artist and shamanic practitionerAnnabelle Wimmer Bakic; Katharina Reuter, Vorsitzende des Bundesverbands Nachhaltige Wirtschaft e.V.; local author Nadège Kusanika; biodiversity specialis Philipp Unterweger, (Un)Sustainability Speakerin Lavinia Muth, grower and open source specialist Roberto Tinoco and Wapke Feenstra with hey tattoos and a call to de-urbanise our gaze.

Invitation: 24 November Event in Van Abbemuseum

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Join us on November 24th, the final day of the Soils exhibition at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, for a special event dedicated to Watching Cow and Landscape (Kijken naar Koe en Landschap). This project explores questions that are not only relevant to farmers, but concern us all, such as solutions for sustainability. We welcome both experts and enthusiasts to look at the soils with us. How can the museum, and especially the art of seeing and watching, help us answer the important questions?

OIL publication: launch and story so far

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OIL online launch Thursday 7th November 6-7pm GMT This publication has developed from ‘Oil as far as the eye can see – Energy regimes in the everyday’ a tour curated and guided by Rachel Grant that took place across Aberdeen, as part of Myvillages’ Summer Camp titled ‘Who Has the Energy’, commissioned, produced and held at Scottish Sculpture Workshop in Lumsden, July 2023. Join us for a presentation and discussion with OIL publication author and editor Rachel Grant (Fertile ground, Aberdeen), Sam Trotman (Programme & Partnerships Director Scottish Sculpture Workshop, Lumsden, Aberdeenshire), Kathrin Böhm (Myvillages) and Scott Herrett (Just Transition Organiser for Friends of the Earth Scotland and member of Friends of St.

SOILS at Van Abbemuseum

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The Brabant chapter of the Cow and Landscape is part of the SOILS exhibition at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, until 24 November 2024. What place can Dutch rural and more-than-human life be given within contemporary art amid growing demands for agricultural transition? We believe that good coexistence between humans and the more-than-human requires us to recognize how the economy is rooted in local cultures and (natural) environments. The work introduces the conceptual framework rural sociologist Inez Dekker and visual artist Wapke Feenstra developed together for this project as they journey through the Netherlands from autumn 2020 to spring 2024.

Lammas Land Haystack

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Haystacks are a series of gatherings about rural undercurrents and practices in urban settings, set up by Kathrin in her home town London May 2013. Haystacks paused during the pandemic, and are restarting with the 2024 Lammas Land Haystack. Haystacks have no fixed location. Previous haystacks are listed here. /|\///|\\\///|||\\\\///\/\\//|\\\//|\\//\\||//|\\

New text in the library: As if it was a farm

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We just added a new text to the website library: "As if it was a farm" was first written by Kathrin and Wapke from Myvillages in November 2023, and revised in January 2024, with input from Inez Dekker and Indra Gleizde, reflecting on questions and suggestions discussed during a Rural School of Economics gathering of friends, collaborators and comrades during the 20th anniversary weekend in Rotterdam in November 2023: “Looking back to the future we want”.

RSoE Writer in Residence - Kevser Güler

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RURAL SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS WRITER IN RESIDENCE ROTTERDAM 2023 We are happy to announce a new activity of learning and reflection in our school - writers in residence. It is made in collaboration with Goethe Instituut Rotterdam. Kevser Güler - a Turkish curator - from 8 till 19 November will be a writer in residence for Rural School of Economics (RSoE), in our base - Rotterdam. She will meet our network and write about our birthday party.

Save the Date_17 November_Myvillages is 20

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Looking back to the future we want – together celebrating and reflecting on 20 years of Myvillages 17 November 2023 in Rotterdam 11:00 - 16:00 Rural Rotterdam Trip 16:00 - 18:00 Gathering at TENT to connect and reconnect 18:00 - 20:00 DeUrbanising the Museum, panel and discussion at TENT 20:30 - 23:00 Party with good food and DJ Reza Afisina in Boerenzij Dear colleagues, friends, supporters and comrades of Myvillages

RSoE exhibition and event program at Radius, Delft

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27 May – 20 August 2023Rural School of Economics takes part in show and program NATURECULTURES Chapter 2: THE GLASS CITY at the Center for Contemporary Art and Ecology - Radius, Delft (NL).For THE GLASS CITY, Rural School of Economics offers a temporary working space for the understanding of the rural beyond the binary with the urban. Instead, the rural is invoked as a place, a mindset, a memory, an amalgam of trans-local territories.

nonkrong 04 am Acker

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nonkrong 04 auf dem Acker:Wie spreche ich mit meinem Dorf ?(Teil 2) A follow up conversation on how to initiate and communicate art and cultural projects in your rural community. After our last conversation at Wohnzimmer Alfter, we are meeting at the farm yard at Mandt, a local organic grower in Alfter. If it's sunny we'll be on the field. Mittwoch 19. April 2023 von 18.00 – 20.00 Uhr

nonkrong at Wohnzimmer Alfter on 22nd March at 18.30 CET

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A third nonkrong in Alfter/Alanus University is taking place on Wednesday 22nd March at Wohnzimmer Alfter with the title "How to talk to my village?" - a question that came up in the previous nonkrong session after a discussion with Hey_Kompost on how to introduce new cultural initiatives to rural communities as a non-local, and how to connect so-called traditional practices with a feminist approach. Einladung an Alle nonkrong 03: Wie spreche ich mit meinem Dorf ?

Plans for 2023

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In early December 2022 we launched "Lumbungsden" together with the Scottish Sculpture Workshop in Lumsden, to honour the enormous achievement and proposition made by ruangrupa during documenta fifteen, and to support the global call for #lumbungcontinues as a localised practice made by many. In the first half of 2023 the Rural School of Economics will be mainly active * in Lumsden with a summer school in early July* in Pushkino, with a trans-local visit from Zvizzchi in May* at Terrra in Brezoi, setting up a new permanent collective place initiated by aaa* and redrawing the economy with Master Business students and growers in Alfter * a year with new local research starting on "

COW CURRENCY Campaign by Rural School of Economics

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Bazo wrote an autobiographical story about the Hamar people and Gele made drawings of his pastoral childhood memories. Lumbung Press at documenta fifteen was happy to print the unique material! And voilà! A publication about Hamar through their own perspective! The Hamar currency is cattle and all land is free to be used by anyone. The book is also a complicated story of a conflict between strict customs and demands for change.

Gemeinsam Ernte Feiern

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DEUTSCHER TEXT: bitte scrollen ***************************************** Rural Undercurrents in and around KasselMeet and Greet, an Economic Summit, Lumbung Kios Market and Drawing Sessions 10 and 11 September 2022 Part of Meydan#3 Weekend at Lumbung Documenta fifteenOrganised by Rural School of Economics and partners Who holds land-based knowledge in a city and where does it become visible? Who are the women who run lasting economies? How can we share without talking?