In this talk, Van Heeswijk will question how the investigative and explorative qualities of art can initiate a durational process from which we can learn collectively how to engage and act upon the world in order to renegotiate the very condition of our existence.

Jeanne van Heeswijk is an artist who facilitates the creation of dynamic and diversified public spaces in order to “radicalize the local”. Her long-scale community-embedded projects question art’s autonomy by combining performative actions, discussions, organizational forms, and alternative pedagogical approaches to enable communities to take control of their own futures.

Noted projects include Hotel New York P.S. 1 in New York (September 1998 to August 1999); De Strip (The Strip) in Westwijk, Vlaardingen (May 2002 – May 2004); Het Blauwe Huis (The Blue House) in Amsterdam (May 2005 – December 2009); Homebaked in Liverpool (November 2011 – present); Freehouse, Radicalizing the Local in Rotterdam (September 2008- present) and Philadelphia Assembled in Philadelphia (2014-2017).

Her work has been featured in numerous books and publications worldwide, as well as internationally renowned biennials such as those of Liverpool, Shanghai, and Venice. She was the 2014-2015 Keith Haring Fellowship in Art and Activism at Bard College and she has received the

2012 Curry Stone Prize for Social Design Pioneers, and in 2011, the Leonore Annenberg Prize for Art and Social Change. She lives and works in Rotterdam and Philadelphia.

General discussion and drinks will follow after the talk.