INLAND extension agent working in the INLAND exhibition, Casco – Office for Art, Design and Theory, June 2015

PUBLISHING CLASS V: INLAND

Seminar 7: Temporary INLAND office at the Werkplaats Typografie

Present: Fernando García-Dory, Sanne Oorthuizen, and Publishing Class participants

Friday 22 May

10.00–12.00 hrs                                         Individual and collective working session

12.00–13.00 hrs                                         Lunch 

13.00–17.00 hrs                                         Individual and collective working session

17.00–18.00 hrs                                         Drinks

The individual INLAND contributions are almost ready to harvest and the Design Committee is setting up a support structure to present, connect (annotations!), and distribute the research gathered. In this month’s collective seminar, we will set up a one-day INLAND Collective Volume office at the Werkplaats Typografie, home to some of the Publishing Class participants. Here, we will work both individually and collectively with the tutors and design committee, to finalize the case studies. We will deepen content through concrete commentary and, crucially, test out how the Collective Volume can manifest and give life to that content in design.

For those interested, on Saturday 20 June, from 14.00–17.00 hrs, we host an informal gathering at Casco with INLAND extension agents currently doing research in the INLAND exhibition, Fernando García-Dory who will give a guided tour, and a discussion with Jan Hartholt, part of the Network for Rural Development at the Dutch ministry for Economy. Much like Publishing Class participants, the INLAND extension agents have been conducting research, mapping INLAND issues in the Netherlands, from the evolution of the Dutch landscape and soil to alternative food systems, commons, and ecofeminism. It is a perfect moment to learn more about what practices exist in the Dutch countryside and how INLAND is envisioning rooting itself here.

Seminar 6: Collective Volume Step 2: entangled mock-up

Present: Fernando García-Dory and Sanne Oorthuizen

10.00–12.00: Group discussion about Collective Volume

12.00–13.00: Lunch at the DAI

13.00–17.00: Group discussion about Collective Volume cont’d

Since March of last year, the participants of Publishing Class V: INLAND have been conducting their individual INLAND case studies, thereby aligning with different communities in various places and countries: from a village in Greece to the flower auctions of Aalsmeer, from the Kurdish countryside to multigenerational farming in Switzerland. All INLAND case studies will be consolidated into one Collective Volume, a publication that will host myriad materials and research queries, offering alternative artistic visions for the countryside.

During last month’s seminar, Publishing Class participants presented their INLAND case studies to the tutors and design committee, while enjoying the sunshine on DAI’s roof. Through conversation, participants discovered both common threads in research and practice, and how these different threads entangled with others in the group. The design committee has since been collecting materials from participants including videos, photographs, content on future performances and reading groups, interviews, and texts. And behind the scenes the editing process is slowly starting up. On Friday 22 May, the design committee will present the first mock-up of the Collective Volume, igniting discussions within the group on how these INLAND case studies can be commoned.

Seminar 5: Collecting INLAND Case Studies: Collective Volume Step 1

 Present: Fernando García-Dory and Sanne Oorthuizen

10.00–12.00 hrs                                 Presentations of final content individual INLAND case studies

12.00–13.00 hrs                                Lunch at DAI

13.00–14.30 hrs                                Presentations of final content individual INLAND case studies

14.30–17.00 hrs                                Group discussion about Collective Volume

Since March last year, the participants of Publishing Class V: INLAND have been conducting their individual INLAND case studies, thereby aligning with different communities in various places and countries: from a village in Greece to the flower auctions of Aalsmeer, from the Kurdish countryside to multigenerational farming in Switzerland. All INLAND case studies will be consolidated into one Collective Volume, a publication that will host myriad materials and research queries, offering alternative artistic visions for the countryside.

For this month’s DAI seminar on Friday 24 April we aim to bring the singular case studies together, the first step toward publishing the INLAND Collective Volume. Each Publishing Class participant is invited to present her or his final content to the group, the tutors, and to the appointed Design Committee. The day ends with a group discussion where we exchange ideas for the Collective Volume and think through collective editing and publishing methods. Fernando García-Dory will document parts of this group discussion, and a resulting video is to be presented in his solo exhibition INLAND at Casco – Office for Art, Design and Theory under the header “Training”, one of INLAND’s many entangled realities (opening 1 May 2015, 18.00 hrs, more information here).

Seminar 4: Friday 27 & Saturday 28 February, at Casco

Friday February 27: Lectures Entanglement: Diagrams for the Commons

13:00 – 13:30 hrs                   Walk-in at Casco

13:30 – 14:15 hrs                   Welcome and launch Entanglement website with Binna Choi and Sanne Oorthuizen

14:15 – 15:00 hrs                   Fernando García-Dory: Para-institutions, thought forms and breaking through diagrams, around the INLAND project

15:00 – 16:00 hrs                   Doina Petrescu and Constantin Petcou (atelier d'architecture autogérée) [studio for self-managed architecture] (aaa): Designing while Commoning

16:00 – 16:30 hrs                   Break

16:30 – 17:30 hrs                   Karen Barad and Kristina Lyons in Skype conversation with Kathrin Thiele

17:30 – 18:00 hrs                   Plenary discussion between contributors moderated by Sanne Oorthuizen

18:00 – 19:00 hrs                   Drinks and Dinner

Saturday 28 February 2015, Casco

Workshop What and how should we map to generate practices of Commoning? by atelier d'architecture autogérée

10:30 – 11:00 hrs                   Welcome and introduction by Fernando García-Dory and Sanne Oorthuizen

11:00 – 11:30 hrs                   Mini-presentation by Dennis van Gaalen for (Un)usual Business

11:30 – 13:00 hrs                   Workshop

13:00 – 14:00 hrs                   Lunch

14:00 – 16:00 hrs                   Workshop cont’d

What if you imagine yourself not as a dot to be tracked, but as a line that continuously passes through, connects, overlaps, and entangles with others? That you are part of myriad shifting diagrams which give you and those around you shape and meaning and effectively make you an entanglement of relations. Casco’s long-term research trajectory Entanglement explores “the lines that we are” as a way of visualizing and generating the commons.

As noted by philosopher and particle physicist Karen Barad, a highly inspiring voice for Entanglement, “Identities are not separable, they do not intersect. Rather, identity formation must be understood in terms of the topological dynamics of iterative intra-activity.” Entanglement is grounded in precisely this ontological basis of “being-in-common”, as well as an interdependent, topological understanding of space. Through our research we learn from artists and social workers, and architects and urban planners, about how to visualize and (re)present complex practices that take place in the folds of a society overrun by the simplified messages of late capitalism.

January 23, 2015: Seminar 3: Let the INLAND research commence!

Present: Fernando García-Dory and Sanne Oorthuizen

Thursday 22 January

10.00–17.00 hrs  Face-to-face meetings with Fernando García-Dory and Sanne Oorthuizen

Friday 23 January

10.00–11.00 hrs  Good morning and reflection on December collective seminar

11.00–13.00 hrs  Discuss texts by John Berger and screening A Day with John Berger (2012)

13.00–14.00 hrs  Lunch at DAI

14.00–16.00 hrs  Consolidating INLAND case studies and team meetings

16.00–17.00 hrs  Plenary discussion

Publishing Class V: INLAND starts the New Year with an exciting prospect: we define and put into practice the INLAND case studies, which will culminate in the publication of the Collective Volume in spring/summer 2015. From the Netherlands to Australia, from Greece to Kurdistan, the INLAND case studies will take place in different localities but share a common ground as they look into how the rural is and can be a site for change. The January face-to-face meetings and collective seminar will be used to consolidate the participants’ research proposals.

During the face-to-face meetings on Thursday 22 January, each participant will present her or his respective INLAND research proposal to core tutor Fernando García-Dory and course leader Sanne Oorthuizen. In conversation, the proposals will be sharpened and consolidated.

On Friday 23 January the group will prepare an initial approximate body of content and structure for what will become our final Collective Volume. In the morning, the group will reflect upon last month’s seminar, discuss two texts by John Berger and watch the documentary A Day with John Berger, which was produced by the Dutch Ministry of Farming in 2012. The afternoon is dedicated to musing about the possible outcomes of each person’s INLAND research. Team meetings will be organized to find similarities and differences between the case studies. The summary and conclusions from these team meetings will be presented at the end of the day, bringing the different researches together, with intersections and overlaps, but also opposing opinions. Let the INLAND research take off!

December 12, 2014: Seminar 2: Publishing and Countryside, or how to make a reader

Present: Casco curator Sanne Oorthuizen, editor Janine Armin and guest co-tutors Robert Hamelijcnk and Nienke Terpsma from Fucking Good Art (FGA)

Friday 12 December
10.00–10.15 hrs Introduction to the day and guest tutors by Sanne Oorthuizen
10.15–10.40 hrs Round of presentations by each student, explaining the image they brought to the first DAI seminar, incorporating the feedback from Fernando García-Dory and Janine Armin
10.40–11.40 hrs Introduction by Fucking Good Art on its history, projects, current moment and a more detailed insight into their Countryside publication project.
11.40–12.00 hrs Q&A and break

12.00—13.00 hrs Common reading discussion about the texts
13.00—13.40 hrs Lunch
13.40—14.10 hrs Round-up of common reading discussion
14.10—14.30 hrs What is a reader and how can it be made? Examples, ideas, and
possible forms by FGA
14.30—17.00 hrs Preparation for impromptu reader

In the second DAI seminar, we will start with another round of face-to-face meetings on Thursday 11 December, joined by Janine Armin, freelance writer and editor who works closely with Casco on publications and other written materials. In the last DAI seminar, the participants brought in and discussed a set of images in a Bilderkritik session. After the DAI week, the participants uploaded a short text in relation to the images they brought in. Fernando García-Dory responded to their texts. In advance of the second DAI seminar, the participants are asked to read through García-Dory's feedback and incorporate it into the text. During the face-to-face meetings, Janine will share more editorial feedback on each of the texts.

On Friday 12 December we are joined by Fucking Good Art (FGA). FGA is an initiative and art criticism magazine run by Rotterdam-based artists Rob Hamelijnck and Nienke Terpsma (http://www.fuckinggoodart.nl/). With their experience dealing with artistic and political content and visual languages as well as the reality of the trade, we will have the chance to understand the different aspects involved in a publishing process.
They will also explain in more detail their Countryside publication series (consisting of 6 issues so far). Later in the day we will have a collective discussion of three texts that will be provided to the participants in advance of the DAI week: an interview with Tom Hodgson in Fucking Good Art's Countryside Issue n. 1 (please also read the bibliography), The artist as Agroecologist by Fernando García-Dory (2009) and the transcription of the Casco event Revolution at Point Zero (2013) with activist and theoretician Silvia Federici that was published in Open!

After Friday's discussion we will divide into three groups. Each group will be assigned one of the texts to use in putting together material for a forthcoming digital reader (PDF). Each group can decide by themselves how they want to shape the reader and if they want to include references. The proposals for the reader will be presented at the end of the day. The final reader materials should be uploaded to the Dropbox before Sunday 4 January. You will receive feedback from García-Dory.

In the spirit of INLAND, during the third DAI seminar in January we will work on how to form a single coherent reader using the produced materials—an exercise of collective work that can lead to, using FGA's words : "something that follows the logic of sushi rather than mayonnaise," or the opposite.

November 7, 2014: Seminar 1: Where We Are: Collective Bilderkritik Session

Present: Fernando García-Dory and Sanne Oorthuizen

Thursday 6 November
10.00–12.00 hrs Face-to-face meetings with Fernando García-Dory and
Sanne Oorthuizen
12.00–13.00 hrs Lunch at DAI
13.00–17.00 hrs Face-to-face meetings cont'd
17.00–19.00 hrs Dinner at DAI
19.00-22.00 hrs Collective gathering

Friday 7 November
10.00-12.00 hrs Collective bilderkritik assignment from Fernando García-Dory with Sanne Oorthuizen
12.00-13.00 hrs Lunch at DAI
13.00-14.00 hrs Landscape exploration of Arnhem (weather permitting)
14.00-17.00 hrs Collective bilderkritik assignment cont'd

Following face-to-face meetings and dinner on Thursday 6 November, our first seminar consists of a gathering during which we learn about each other's practices, thoughts, and expectations for Publishing Class V: INLAND. We introduce the program and Fernando García-Dory's long-term project INLAND, whereby connections are formed with various rural communities, and which serves as a point of departure for the class.

On Friday 7 November participants work on a bilderkritik [image critique] assignment by García-Dory. In the week before we meet, please upload two images (one current, one historical) related to farming and/or the rural to a shared Dropbox. These images are presented to the group on the morning of the assignment. Weather permitting, we then explore the natural landscape of Arnhem. Upon returning, we exchange our images amongst each other and discuss them in small groups in light of the day's semi-rural experiences. Each group is asked to write down their bilderkritik analyses to be uploaded to the Dropbox, which serves as a communal platform through which knowledges can be shared over the course of the year, hosting research and materials for publication by the class. In advance of December's seminar, García-Dory gives his feedback on the image analyses, thereby establishing a common INLAND glossary from which to work.