SPECULATIVE PECULIARS - AMSTERDAM 2059

2010-09-16T02:46:00.000-07:00

Hello all,

Long time..but we are proud to finally present the fifth and last Speculative Peculiars fanzine.
Check it out here.

We would like to thank all the people who were involved in Spec Pec with all our hearts.
THANK YOU!

The series is closed, but when someone is interested in a follow-up, please contact us at speculativepeculiars@gmail.com

Speculative Peculiars Fanzine #4 is online!

2010-01-10T05:10:00.000-08:00

Take a look at the fourth Speculative Peculiars Fanzine here!

Speculative Peculiars #5, Sunday January 10 at 4 PM

2010-01-04T07:31:00.000-08:00

Come and check out the fifth Speculative Peculiars featuring:

Jasper van den Berg, graphic designer

Meinbert Gozewijn van Soest, visual artist

What is the connection between eternity and transitoriness?

Meinbert Gozewijn van Soest has been contemplating this question for years, for example in his Cabinet of Relics, a personal reference collection. The question is also central to his drawings. It is not a fascination by the dark side of life, but Meinbert Gozewijn rather wants to emphasize the vulnerable elements of life. "Scientific research makes use of established, preferably abiding facts. My research, however, is an intuitive quest for a personal order in exactly those matters that are continuously subject to change", says Meinbert Gozewijn about his working process. His drawings have of a sinister and yet strangely appealing atmosphere.

Roel Boorsma & Thomas Wurdinger, filmmaker & molecular biologist

Thomas Würdinger is a molecular biologist. He is connected as research fellow to Harvard Medical School in Boston (USA) and VU Medical Center in Amsterdam. At VU Medical Center he is - together with surgeon David Noske - principal investigator of the Neuro-oncology Research Group (NRG). His area of research is cancer, with a special focus on brain tumors.

Sieto Noordhoorn, visual artist

I - Marty Noordhoorn - am a regular guy from 2059. I am living in a suburb and I am working as a quantum mechanic. Unfortunately, I never met my father Sieto Noordhoorn. Since it is possible to travel through time, I started looking for my past. However, time traveling is either for the rich or it is done in groups. The group travels only offer trips to disasters of the past. So, I adapted my Opel Astra (car) and started time traveling myself. During my adventures I met strange family members. I have gathered visual material, which I will use to tell you about my travels. And, I will try to link my journey to my current time, namely 2059. I will talk about my work, study, home, friends etc. You know, just the usual.

Speculative Peculiars
when: Sunday, January 10 at 4 PM
where: Sid Lee Collective Gallery at Gerard Doustraat 74

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2010-01-04T07:29:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year to you all!

The next Speculative Peculiars will take place Sunday January 10 at Sid Lee Collective Gallery in Amsterdam at 4 PM.

More soon..

Speculative Peculiars FANZINE #3 is online!

2009-12-04T03:21:00.000-08:00

The fanzine of Speculative Peculiars part 3 is ready.
Speculative Peculiars#3 took place on November 1st.
Click here to check it out. Enjoy.

The next Speculative Peculiars is coming Sunday on the 'official' birthday of Sinterklaas: December 6th at 4 PM. The event takes place at Sid Lee Collective Gallery at Gerard Doustraat 74 in Amsterdam. Come and enjoy what our participants - Hans Gremmen, Chris Keulemans, Janne&Melle Kromhout and Pieter Paul Pothoven - have cooked up specially for you.

See ya.

Speculative Peculiars, part 4 - INVITATION

2009-11-16T09:05:00.000-08:00

Next: Speculative Peculiars #4, December 6th, 4 PM

2009-11-07T03:38:00.000-08:00

Speculative Peculiars, part 4 will take place on Sunday the 6th of December, at 4 PM at Sid Lee Collective Gallery at Gerard Doustraat 74, Amsterdam.

Featuring:

Hans Gremmen, graphic designer and co-founder Fw:

Hans Gremmen (Langenboom, 1976) studied graphic design at the art academy AKV l Sint Joost in Breda. His master degree he got at the Werkplaats Typografie in Arnhem. As a designer he works for architects, artists and photographers. Gremmen is one of the co-founders of Fw:, a platform for contemporary photography. And, he is a guest lecturer at Artez, the art academy in Arnhem, at AKV l St. Joost in Breda and at the art department of the University of Kassel (Germany). He is the author of Empty Trashcan (AKV l St. Joost), Serendipity (Roma Publishers) and Fake Flowers in Full Colour (Fw: 2009). The last publication he made in collaboration with photographer Jaap Scheeren. Currently, the project Fake Flowers in Full Colour is on display at FOAM, the photography museum in Amsterdam.

Chris Keulemans, writer and artistic director Tolhuistuin

Chris Keulemans (Tunis, 1960) is a cultural organizer, writer, traveler and journalist, living in Amsterdam. During the late-nineties, he was director of De Balie, a centre for culture and politics in Amsterdam. He wrote several novels and non-fiction works. He writes on regular basis for de Volkskrant, Vrij Nederland en De Gids. Currently he’s director of the new cultural centre Tolhuistuin.

Melle en Janne Kromhout, scientist, musician & fashion designer

Janne Kromhout (Amsterdam, 1977) is clothing designer. Since 2005 she develops her own fashion collections. She studied at the Art Academy in Utrecht (HKU) and specialized in clothing and pattern design at the Rotterdamse Snijschool. As well as for her free work as for her assignments from film costumes to wedding dresses, Janne is inspired by the ‘20s, ‘40s and ’50 of the last century. In her work she strives for personal and unique designs that can bring forth the identity of the bearer.

Melle Kromhout (Amsterdam, 1984) studied Science of Music and Cultural Analysis at the University of Amsterdam. He specialized in Popular Music Studies. In his thesis he focused on performance, the use of ‘noise’ in the work of the German band Einstürzende Neubauten and the social engagement of the electronics-artist Matthew Herber. Besides his academic background, he is a musician in several bands and music projects, freelance advisor, text writer and researcher. He is co-founder and editor of the online magazine on art and journalistics hard//hoofd.

Pieter Paul Pothoven, visual artist

Pieter Paul Pothoven (1981) is a multi-media artist working and living in Amsterdam. He studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy and the Universität der Kunst in Berlin. After graduating he worked on various projects in the Middle-east. He recorded bird- and swamp sounds in different marshes in Lebanon, Iran and Israel. Recently he visited the Lapis Lazuli mines in Afghanistan in search of the origins of the blue pigment ultramarine blue.

Posters in the city of Speculative Peculiars #3

2009-11-07T03:30:00.000-08:00

If you have any quote suggestions, please send an email to speculativepeculiars@gmail.com

Speculative Peculiars Fanzine#2 is available!

2009-10-26T02:44:00.000-07:00

Check out the second Speculative Peculiars Fanzine.
Scroll through or download here.

Invitation: Speculative Peculiars, part 3. Join us on November 1st at 4 PM!

2009-10-20T08:27:00.000-07:00

Joost Conijn is an artist.

The motto is: do it. Go for it completely: a plan, a journey, a film. Inspired, deliberately uninhibited. Joost Conijn sets up a gate in the desert that opens automatically. Takes off in a plane that he built himself. Travels through Russia in a wood-powered car made of wood, all the way to the Chernobyl zone. Films the neighbourhood kids for a year, capturing their life on the fringes of society. Improves his plane and then crashes it. Cycles through the Moroccan Rif Mountains with two friends; they use their hands to communicate with one another about what’s going on in the world. He moves through life with an independent attitude and plays the big game of art. With bravura, and yet totally straight.

Source: http://www.environmentalhealthclinic.net/uncategorized/joost-conijn-2/

For Speculative Peculiars he will elaborate on his ideas around the development and production of a Low Tech House.

Rutger Groot Wassink is historian and politician. He works as a policy advisor specialized in labor market and social security for FNV Vakcentrale (FNV Union). Currently, he is also working as fraction chairman of Groen Links for city council Amsterdam Westerpark. In the council his main area of interest is on social housing and urban development.

As one of the youngest and most of all happiest entrepreneurs in the world, Nalden is regularly sought out for his fresh perspective and obstinate but clever style of consulting on everything from music and gadgets to authenticity and reinventing word-of-mouth. With a background in the music- and advertising industry, his expertise of online-trends and most of all; as powerful blogger with his unique and internationally recognized blog, Nalden.net, he keeps reinventing himself and other businesses.

As a 'social entrepreneur' he's focused on exploring new ways to reach people without interrupting them, in which he already succeeded with his Wallpaper Advertising business model on Nalden.net. With his knowledge about technology and the impact this new media is having on the world he's always working on connecting the dots to make this a better world to live in, by sharing, supporting and investing.

Since 2005 Frederik Molenschot runs his Studio Frederik Molenschot. His work is about designing products, interiors and public spaces. He starts every job with a research into the topic(s) at stake and some of his projects are research based only. In this case the research becomes the product. His focus at Speculative Peculiars will be the growth of cities translated into a fine art piece and materials that are used in the cities.

Patricia de Ruijter is an artist. She is initiator and curator of several international experimental Test-Portal now-Art exhibitions. She presented these events among other places at NDSM Wharf in Amsterdam. Art is for her more than an end product. It is something to be experienced physically en mentally, something that takes a whole life to develop. We are responsible for our own life and therefore it is possible to design a lot ourselves. De Ruijter is interested in the human relation to its environment, mentally, digitally as well as physically and spiritually. Recently, she opened Test-Portal now-Art Gallery at Westerdok 272 in Amsterdam.

JaJa architects also move towards 2059

2009-10-12T08:42:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the World anno 2059.
Check it out on the JaJa-blog.

What happened at Speculative Peculiars, part 2?

2009-10-08T08:41:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday, October 4th 2009 at 4PM another collective daydream took place at Sid Lee Collective's gallery in Amsterdam: Speculative Peculiars, part 2.

Below you find some images of the day including a performance about the future as a black hole by Daniela Bershan (1-3); diary entries of a creative in the Creative Capital Amsterdam of 2059 by Edwin Gardner (4); and, last but not least, three interviews with future youth in Amsterdam about their way of living by Liedewij Loorbach (5).

Image 6 is our host Maurits Martijn in conversation with the audience. The images are made by Sid Lee's Andreas Widman.

More insight information will follow. The next Fanzine is in the making and will be published soon.

The next Speculative Peculiars will take place on Sunday, November 1st, same time, same place. See you around!

What happened at Speculative Peculiars, part 2?

2009-10-08T08:19:00.001-07:00

Speculative Peculiars Fanzine, part 1 online

2009-10-08T02:35:00.000-07:00

After each event Speculative Peculiars publishes a fanzine. In the end a bigger publication will follow.

Speculative Peculiars Fanzine, part 1 is out now and online. Check it out!

Note: for best view of fanzine choose 'presentation' option in left corner. Thanks.

Speculative Peculiars, part 2: Sunday October 4th, 4 PM

2009-09-28T07:58:00.000-07:00

Featuring:

Daniela Bershan is an artist. She makes sculptures, installations, performances and saaaaooooooounds. Her work*play is based on process and growth. Loss of control and organic short cuts lead her towards inevitable forms and situations that are neither constructed nor random. The love for transparency - the "paradox of enchanting disenchantment" is omnipresent in her work: “to see thru helps me to be sufficiently blind”.

ENHANCE ARTIPLICITY!

OPTIMISE ART TO DISPERSE ITS ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT!

DEVELOP METHODS OF CRAP PROTECTION!

IMPROVE FREEDOM, TOLERANCE AND RESISTANCE!

Daniela Bershan lives and works in De Bijlmer, Amsterdam. Next to her research and practice she works as a DJ and producer a.k.a. Baba Electronica.

Edwin Gardner is architect, web-editor and theorist working for Volume/Archis and Partizan Publik. Find out more on Gardner's website.

Rutger Groot Wassink is trained as a historian. He works as a policy advisor specialized in labor market and social security for FNV Vakcentrale (FNV Union). Currently, he is also working as fraction chairman of Groen Links for city council Amsterdam Westerpark. In the council his main areas of interest are social housing and urban development.

Night life, pop music, youth culture, these are the most favorite topics of freelance journalist Liedewij Loorbach. From June 2004 until September 2009 Loorbach, born in Rotterdam, worked for the Amsterdam Newspaper Het Parool. She wrote about street rappers, drug controls at parties and basically everything that happens in the city between five and nine in the morning. With a colleague of the paper she wrote the book ‘Kroeglopen in Amsterdam’ (‘Pubbing in Amsterdam’). Last September she has quit her job to start her freelance practice to see what lay beyond the limitations of the paper's twenty to two thousand word articles.

Speculative Peculiars, part 2, is hosted by journalist and Amsterdammer Maurits Martijn.

Not Amsterdam, but Rotterdam in 2059

2009-09-25T08:55:00.000-07:00

Our 'Dichter des Vaderlands' (our National Poet) Ramsey Nasr wrote a poem about Rotterdam, the town he was born, in 2059. He wrote the poem mi have een droom in connection with yesterday's opening of the Architecture Biennial in Rotterdam. The theme of the biennial is 'Open City'.

Nasr wrote and recites the poem in authentic Rotterdams of the future. Enjoy: mi have een droom (Rotterdam, 2059)

So, apparently more people are thinking about the future in 2059, and not only in connection with Amsterdam or Montreal, yeah!

Next Speculative Peculiars: Sunday October 4th

2009-09-12T07:31:00.000-07:00

The second and next Speculative Peculiars will take place with participation of:

Edwin Gardner: architect, web-editor and theorist working for Volume/Archis and Partizan Publik
Rutger Groot Wassink: policy advisor on labour market and social security at FNV vakcentrale and fraction chairman of Groen Links in Amsterdam Westerpark
Liedewij Loorbach: freelance journalist
Daniela Bershan: artist

More info follows soon.

When: Sunday, October 4th at 4 PM
Where: Sidlee Collective Canteen Gallery, Gerard Doustraat 72-80

Speculative Peculiars kick off..

2009-09-12T07:12:00.001-07:00

Jan Rothuizen is explaining his 2059 vision to the audience

The first Speculative Peculiars event is a fact with great contributions of the participants and a good turn out of people. Thanks to you all.

More information on the contributions of the 6th of September will be published soon. The next Speculative Peculiars will take place on the 4th of October, same time, same place.

See you there.

INVITATION, please join us the 6th of September at 4 PM

2009-08-28T08:55:00.000-07:00

Featuring
Marjolijn van Heemstra
Roosje Klap
Katja Prins
Jan Rothuizen
Reimer van Tuinen

Hosted by
Maurits Martijn - journalist of Vrij Nederland (VN) and Amsterdammer

WHAT IF REAL ESTATE WENT ROBOTIC? Speculative one liners spark the city..

2009-08-17T06:26:00.000-07:00

Last Friday we started the official campaign of Speculative Peculiars.

With speculative one liners we try to spark your imagination. Please let us know what yours would be, and maybe next time you see it float by when you pass a Wildplakzuil in the city of Amsterdam.

FIRST EVENT: AMSTERDAM, SEPTEMBER 6

2009-07-27T05:33:00.000-07:00

when: Sunday, SEPTEMBER 6 at 4 P.M. (16.00 hrs)
where: SID LEE, Gerard Doustraat 74, AMSTERDAM,

The first kick-off event of Speculative Peculiars will feature the following people. We are happy to have them on board!

Marjolijn van Heemstra: Publicist, theatre maker and theologian
She studied religions and media at the University of Amsterdam. Together with Hanina Ajarai she wrote a book about the first generation female immigrants women Morocco living in the Netherlands called ‘Land van Werk en Honing’ (‘Land of Work and Honey’). She wrote and performed in several plays, some of them she directed herself. She is currently working on her first book of poetry. In her work she is trying to reveal the hidden mystery in our over interpreted world. She’s reaching beyond our modern explanations and concoctions and tries to touch the secret connections, images and memories that are so often forgotten.

Roosje Klap: Graphic designer

She’s runs a studio in the centre of Amsterdam. Her sponsors and clients are mostly from the cultural field like museums and galleries. She loves making books. She also teaches at art academies in The Netherlands and abroad. Besides her commissions as a graphic designer, she’s works as an installation artist. Last year she participated in an extensive 4-month residency project at the Chinese European Art Center in Xiamen, China, about implosion and explosion, as a reaction to modern day 'frenzy' in global architecture.

Katja Prins: Jewellery designer
After the M.T.S. vakschool in Schoonhoven she studied at the Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. Her work featured in many exhibitions all over the world and is part of several public collections. Currently her work is exhibited in the museum of arts and design in New York. She’s also a teacher on various art schools all over the world and she isactive as a critic and a lecturer. Among others, she is fascinated by how the human body interacts with ongoing technical, medical and biological (like genetic engineering etc) developments.

Jan Rothuizen: Artist

Rothuizen makes beautiful drawings, photos and writings. His work is exhibited from Singapore Art Museum to the New Museum in New York City. Rothuizen is born and raised in Amsterdam; he lived and worked in Guang Zhou, China, in New York, Berlin and Cairo. He just came back from a residency in the Bijlmer in Amsterdam. His work centers on the subjective experience of the city and the self. Today he is working on a book called ‘Zachte Atlas van Amsterdam’ (‘Soft Atlas of Amsterdam’) which features drawn maps of experienced locations in the city.

Reimer van Tuinen: Media specialist
Van Tuinen is a critic of the moving image, a movie lover and a filmmaker. He is one of the founders of the InfoWarroom, a monthly show in De Balie (cultural center in Amsterdam) on contemporary visual culture that ran for three straight years. His thoughts, his articles, selected clips and frames can be seen on zahrady, a website dedicated to the moving image. Currently Reimer is writing and working on his first feature film.

Students from Gerrit Rietveld Academie

More information to come..

INVITATION

2009-07-27T05:30:00.001-07:00

Speculative Peculiars invites all kinds of people from Amsterdam and Montreal to use the tools they’ve acquired on the job—writing, designing, art directing, inventing, strategizing, mapping or doodling—to express their time traveling, mind-altering vision on Amsterdam and Montreal in 2059.

In Amsterdam, there will also be a collaboration between Speculative Peculiars and students of the Gerrit Rietveld Academie.

SPECULATIVE… WHAT?

2009-07-27T05:29:00.000-07:00

2059 Speculative Peculiars is an imaginary and visionary glance at the future of urban landscapes. It is an interdisciplinary program about the possible and the impossible, the politics, subcultures, developments and conventions that will govern and shape Amsterdam and Montreal 50 years from now.

Speculative Peculiars wants to explore how we’ll live, work and socialize in the future. What kind of places we would frequent and what kind of people we would meet. It wants to map how we would give meaning to our surroundings.

BUT WHAT DOES THIS MEAN, REALLY?

2009-07-27T05:28:00.000-07:00

2059 Speculative Peculiars consists of five public events where artists, writers, scholars, scientists, designers, politicians, etc. will give their impression of their cities in 50 years time from now. They are asked to research trends from today, something they see as important, or maybe even irreversible, and extrapolate these trends to the not-so-distant future. Their work will also be available in fanzines, through the Speculative Peculiars blog and the Sid Lee Collective blog.

Sid Lee will select the work of two participants, one from each city, and will start a development and production phase. This project must be of extreme value in Amsterdam or Montreal, in 50 years from now.

WHY THE FUTURE?

2009-07-27T05:27:00.002-07:00

Because of its unpredictable nature.
Because the future is the only place that cannot be measured, probed, or scanned.
Because science is on equal ground with arts and politics.
Because we need all the current knowledge, creativity, and vision to make the future comes alive.
In essence, we’re going boldly into the future in order to know more about the present.

INSPIRATION

2009-07-27T05:27:00.001-07:00

So, what about..

Labour/Energy/Technology
Meaning/Spirituality/Philosophy
Love/Friendship/Relationship/Family
Space/Time/Movement/Transport/Travel
Money/Globalization/Capitalism/Accumulation
Public/Private/Home/Leisure/Work/Safety
Leadership/Politics/Policy/Visionary/Ideology
Architecture/Infrastructure/Living/Cityscape
Identity/Image/Others/Migration/Conventions
Urban/Rural/Suburban/Nurture/Nature
Aesthetics/Music/Arts/Design/Meaning
Media/Image/Cyborg/Identity/Space
Language/Communication/Media
Crime/Underworld/Laws/Morals
Life cycle/Generations/Choices
Nature/Culture/Sustainability

..in the cities of 2059?

PROGRAM

2009-07-27T05:26:00.000-07:00

Their ideas will be put out there for all to worship through public events (monthly exhibits held in the Amsterdam gallery), fanzines (published), and the best ideas will be further developed in the laboratory (financed, marketed, displayed).

Program dates Amsterdam
Every first Sunday of the month, at 4 p.m., Speculative Peculiars will take place in the gallery-café-space of Sid Lee in Amsterdam, on Gerard Doustraat 74 (there is also an entrance on Albert Cuyp Street).

First event: September 6, 4 p.m.
Second event: October 4, 4 p.m.
Third event: November 1, 4 p.m.
Fourth event: December 6, 4 p.m.
Fifth event: January 10, 4 p.m. --> Be aware..this is the 2nd Sunday of the month

QUESTIONS? TO PARTICIPATE

2009-07-27T05:25:00.000-07:00

Do you have more questions? Or do you want to participate?
Talk to us: speculativepeculiars@sidlee.com

PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT

2009-07-07T08:10:00.000-07:00

Speculative Peculiars has been developed for Sid Lee Collective by Christiaan Fruneaux and Femke Lutgerink.

Christiaan Fruneaux graduated on Modern Asian History at the University of Amsterdam, Netherlands. From 2003 until 2006, he worked for De Balie as a programmer. In 2006, he founded Partizan Publik, a bureau for applied social science that operates on the cutting edge of academic scholarship, art, and social policy. Presently, Christiaan is working on some highly secretive writing projects. He lived and worked in Jakarta, Damascus, and Beirut.

Femke Lutgerink is trained as an art historian at the University of Amsterdam, Netherlands. Since 2002, she is working as an independent curator based in Amsterdam. Femke is artistic co-director of FOTODOK, an international place for documentary photography in Utrecht, Netherlands. She is also working on a long-term project called the Detroit Unreal Estate Agency, in Detroit (Michigan, USA).

Sid Lee Collective—Creative incubator and emporiums
Sid Lee Collective is an incubator that allows the Sid Lee team to push the boundaries of creativity further. Sid Lee Collective undertakes cultural and commercial projects in the fields of visual arts, industrial design, music, publishing, etc. A brainchild of Sid Lee, the Collective thrives on collaboration and experimentation.