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Collaborative Handwork at Atgender Conference 2024: A Materialization of Learning Ecosystems

CARADT researchers bas van den hurk and Wander Eikelboom, along with students and alumni, recently participated in the ATGENDER 2024 conference. Through a unique collaborative handwork project, they engaged attendees in creating a large-scale, collective artwork that embodied the conference’s themes of precarity, gender, and interconnectedness. This initiative is part of their ongoing research into ecosystemic and collective learning models, demonstrating the power of creativity in fostering dialogue and connection.

bas van den hurk and Wander Eikelboom participated in this year’s ATGENDER Conferencearrow, themed Gender Studies and The Precarious Labor of Making a Difference. This annual international conference focuses on gender studies and brings together scholars, artists, and activists from around the world to explore gender-related issues in contemporary society.

As part of their ongoing research A Learning Ecosystem for Creation and Innovationarrow, Bas and Wander collaborated with students and alumni, including Melike Karaslan, Niels van Rijsbergen (CMD-Breda), and Rosalie Custers (alumnus Koningstheater), to develop a unique project that would engage the conference participants in a collective handwork experience.

Throughout the weekend, participants were invited to contribute to a large-scale collaborative piece by crocheting, knitting, braiding, and embroidering with donated materials from friends, family, and attendees. This collective craftwork unfolded across various moments of the conference, from keynote talks to casual discussions over lunch, offering participants a tactile and engaging way to reflect on the conference’s themes.

bas and Wander’s project was more than just an artistic intervention; it was a means of fostering connections and prompting conversations about precarity, ecosystems, and collective learning. The handwork acted as a metaphor for the entangled relationships and embodied knowledge that emerged during the conference, mirroring the interconnectedness of ideas, practices, and people. As one attendee put it, “The best conference experience ever.”

The final result of this weekend of creative collaboration was a large-scale handmade installation, symbolizing the ecosystem that had taken shape during the event. This collective craftwork not only visually materialized the discussions and interactions of the participants but also sparked personal conversations about their research, practices, and experiences with precariousness.

A learning ecosystem for creation and innovation: exercises in ecosystem contamination, assembly and collectivity.

‘Precarity is the condition of being vulnerable to others. Unpredictable encounters transform us; we are not in control, even of ourselves. Unable to rely on a stable structure of community, we are thrown into shifting assemblages, which remake us as well as our others.’ – Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing

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‘How can we disrupt the notion of being human while staying true to being humane?’

Wander Eikelboom (1973) is a researcher and cultural critic who studied critical humanities at the University of Utrecht.

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‘How do we live together, how do we work together? How do we give shape and form to ‘being together’ in the broadest sense?’

bas van den hurk is an artist, tutor and researcher. He studied Fine Art at Academy St. Joost in Breda and Philosophy of Aesthetics at the University of Amsterdam. van den hurk teaches contemporary theory, research and practice at St. Joost, and is a regular lecturer at different academies and institutions in the Netherlands and abroad.

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Research Group: Cultural and Creative Industries

The research group Cultural and Creative Industries investigates the role of artists and designers as creative innovators and drivers of social and economic change. Affiliated researchers analyse the cultural and creative industries from a critical point of view and examine the conditions under which timely forms of aesthetic expression and social connectedness can actually take place within the precarious reality of this field. What economic models are required by artists and designers to create a meaningful practice within the aesthetic, social, and economic intentions of the cultural and creative industries? What skills sets are required for those artists and designers who don’t just want to follow movements, but actually shape novel social and economic models of the future?

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