SAVE THE DATE
This November 2022, the Berlin-based Envisioning Free Space Conference (also known as Frei(T)räume) arrives in Amsterdam.
The conference creates a space for interdisciplinary collaboration to drive policy change. We are gathering to explore how to build a city whose citizens have the opportunity to shape the environment in which they live - by creating a space for experimentation and manifesting the discoveries that take place into actionable legislation.
From dusk till dawn, 24-hours at De School we will host workshops and panel discussions punctuated by nightly explorations of sound, visuals and performance by a rich and interwoven network of voices: urban change makers, political agents, spatial pioneers, scientists, artists, musicians and you. The conference program is organized around topics of DanceofUrgency and SpaceofUrgency, which have been developed internationally in the last 7 years. Together we'll manifest a vision of the future: a city for all, where night culture is culturally valued and embedded in urban policy and cultural free spaces are self-sufficient and thriving.
How can nightlife change the way we live in the daytime? We'll realise a city whose long-term social value supersedes short-term economic profit; a city where cultural free spaces are recognised as microcosms of our wider community and vital laboratories for social-ecological innovation. In a city where dance has a socio-political function and empowers people, it heals and helps us in times of crisis. In the sparks of last year's pandemic, recent protests and civil disobedience, we aim to unite voices and create solutions to the structural challenges of access to space, developing tools and practical solutions for venues and creatives to do the same.
Through the arts, we incorporate perspectives from queer migrant communities, those fleeing wars and further underrepresented and marginalised groups. By unlearning the top-down approaches, we will reclaim and re-envision Amsterdam through trans-local learning and create new bases for international knowledge-sharing. Supporting this by creating sites of imagination and experimentation is integral to individual development, community building, young artists' creative growth, gathering points for activism, community care and catharsis. They house the living, dreaming organism of arts and culture.
We invite you to participate in envisioning our future(s). Together, we'll examine how we might create more robust and equitable urban planning strategies and strengthen independent cultural spaces against future crises.
Together we'll explore...
->HOW CAN WE PROTECT OUR FREE SPACES, CLUBS, AND CULTURAL VENUES FROM HYPERINFLATION?
->IN A CITY THAT IS CONSTANTLY GROWING- HOW CAN WE GROW INCLUSIVELY?
->WHICH ROLE DO DANCING AND PROTEST PLAY IN EMPOWERING INDIVIDUALS TO SURVIVE URGENCIES?
->HOW CAN WE CREATE AFFORDABLE LIVING AND WORKSPACES FOR YOUNG CREATIVES?
->HOW CAN CITY ADMINISTRATIONS SUPPORT SELF-ORGANIZATION?
->HOW CAN INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGIES AND GOVERNANCE STRUCTURES ENHANCE OUR RESILIENCE AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY?
->WHAT SOLUTIONS DO FREE SPACES OFFER FOR SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL TRANSITION?
->HOW CAN WE ENVISION A SAFE(R) QUEER MIGRANT NIGHTLIFE?
->HOW CAN WE ENABLE THE NEXT GENERATION OF CULTURAL SPACES?
->WHICH NEW URBAN TOOLS AND PARTICIPATORY APPROACHES ARE MEANINGFULL ANTIDOTES TO GENTRIFICATION?
-> HOW CAN OUR INDEPENDENT CULTURAL SPACES BECOME TRULY SAFE(R) SPACES FOR FLEEING CREATIVES AND COMMUNITIES?
->WHAT WILL YOUR DANCE AND SPACE BE ABOUT? HOW CAN WE HELP YOU TO CREATE THAT SPACE?
The “Envisioning Free Space” conference is the culmination of an ongoing collaboration between curators/researchers Liese Kingma and Bogomir Doringer. Supported by the departments of (Vrije Ruimte & Bureau Broedplaatsen (City of Amsterdam), EFS’22 seeks to provide an enhancement of the cultural mycelium, devise a contribution to building a common narrative for culture and the arts and develop methods of embedding nightlife within the spatial design of the city. Here, the voices of under-represented communities are prioritized; collectively, we’ll propose solutions to the challenges of access that are truly by and for these same communities using nightlife as a bastion of self-expression and creativity.
Envisioning Free Space IG
Space of Urgency
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