Handimals

Our hands have animalesque qualities, and are a versatile base for creating animals that can come to live by moving our hands. I have designed this as a craft for kids between the ages of 7 and 12. (more info soon!!)

Adventure Playground & Instruments from Recycled materials.

Since May 2008 I work at the ‘Adventure Playground’, a unique Building and Craft playground (there is only one other like it in the USA). Kids come here to work with tools, like hammers and saws, and work on small and large projects with their friends and family. In the playground most permanent structures (we call them forts) are built by the kids. Children work in an environment where parents, camp counselors and staff, supervise play and assist in projects when necessary. This playground is a rich learning environment where children encounter their own limits and possibilities and learn through experience. When people ask us how safe a playground like this actually is, we can tell them that research has shown that more accidents happen in ‘normal’ playgrounds then in Adventure Playgrounds.
For the Adventure Playground I have designed two instrument-building projects and executed these with the children. For these instruments we used recycled materials.

The Music Tower is a larger than life percussion tower that children and parents can play on together.

The hand instruments are simple objects made with everyday trash.

2012Architects, building with waste materials.

Between January 2003 and June 2007 I was the office manager and development associate at 2012Architects. 2012Architects is a Rotterdam based office specialized in using waste materials in architecture projects. The work I did for 2012 varied from coordinating the production of their exhibitions, assistance in acquisition activities, writing marketing texts and coordinating and writing grant proposals.
Examples of activities:
- The presentation of the Miele Space Station at the Parasite Paradise exhibition in Utrecht about mobile architecture.
- The building process, data collecting and editing work for the 2012Architects website. www.2012architecten.nl
- The production and PR for the mobile overview exhibition of the work of 2012Architects presented in a long shop window downtown Rotterdam and at the RAP architectural center in the city of Leiden.

Georgia Artists in Residence, GeoAIR

In 2005 the Georgian artist Sophia Tabatadze and I founded GeoAIR. GeoAIR organizes and supports international exchange projects with the goal of strengthening the Georgian and Caucasian art world, bringing together artists from different cultural backgrounds and finding relevant contexts for them to work in. Besides this, GeoAIR raises awareness and stimulates engagement with art and culture from this region. The foundation works together with international individuals and organizations that share it’s goals. GeoAIR has also become, over the last 2 years, an intermediary for individuals and organizations that seek connection with the arts in the republic of Georgia and the region of the Caucasus.

Re-activating Gerard Scholtenstraat 96a

In 1997 the city counsel of Rotterdam granted a group of homeowners, home renters and squatters in the Gerard Scholtenstreet a 15-year ‘ownership’ of their houses. This was the successful result of a lobby for an alternative plan to keep the houses inhabited instead of the housing companies proposal to tear them down. I was one of the lucky members of this group of inhabitants know as ‘2012 Vereniging’.

Two of the 25 units stayed uninhabited for social, construction and storing purposes. One of them was a burnt out first floor that we used as a bike garage for several years (house nr 96a). In 2004, I proposed to restore the space and give it basic facilities such as a toilet, water, heat and electricity. We started with a little budget from the 2012 Vereniging. During the process we decided that 96a should be made available for small-scale social and artistic activities by the members of the 2012 Vereniging which would give the space a social function in the street and neighborhood. This made it possible to get local funding for the project. In May 2007 the project was granted an ‘Opzomerster’, a local award for projects that contribute to the social cohesion of a neighborhood.

Educational projects for kids and teens at ‘the ArtFort near Vijfhuizen’

The ArtFort near Vijfhuizen is a unique place for art and education. It was built in the 19th century as one of the 27 forts of the defense ring around Amsterdam. After years of neglect a group of volunteers made a plan for the fort, collected money and planned a restoration for it’s new function as an art center, hotel and restaurant which are all running since 2004.

In the spring of 2007 the ArtFort near Vijfhuizen hired me for a number of assignments related to the development of their educational services. The main tasks were related to the launch of the publication of the children’s book ‘Vlucht’ (Escape, for ages 9 through 12) by the award winning author of children’s books Mireille Geus. The story in the book takes place in and around the fort and is partially based on a story the author found in the archives of the defense of Amsterdam. Teens of a local high school read the book and visited the fort to learn about the history, the nature around the fort and to get inspiration for writing their own fiction story and illustrations related to the fort. For this project I worked on the PR for the launching of the book, the distribution to bookstores, and the logistics for the visit of 10 high school classes during 1 week. I hosted these visits and worked with teachers and children on their assignments.

Besides the work related to the book Vlucht, I also assisted in the development and PR of three other educational projects. Two of them I designed together with the visual artist Geertje Tjalma. In these projects Geertje will work with primary school children making sculptural images related to different aspects of the fort. The projects are called ‘What lives in the fort?’ and ‘Protection’. The third project I helped develop is WonderWeb for which we adapted an existing nature awareness project. In this project kids research the direct surroundings of the fort. Working at the ArtFort was a great pleasure.

Wil de Wit in conversation with Rotterdam based artists.

Wil de Wit alias Rotterdam is a personification of the city of Rotterdam. As Wil de Wit I talk with Rotterdam based artists about our relationship and how they feel about me. The conversations reveal how the artists interact with the city’s character on an emotional and personal level and in what ways their artistic production is related to the character of the city. I am interested in the conscious and subconscious relations between artists and their place of residence.
The bimonthly art zine FuckingGoodArt published conversations between Wil de Wit and the artists Aletta de Jong, Dwight Marica, Harmen de Hoop and Karel Doing.
For more information visit: www.fuckinggoodart.nl

ATTICA I. A site specific sound performance.

13-10-’06 at WORM Rotterdam, center for experimental music and film. Percussion; Diego Espinosa, concept; Freya van Dien
The newly renovated, 333 year old WORM building came with a lot of demands, but also with some surprises: one of them being the three 35 cubic meter black metal soda kettles located in the attic. Silent and invisible to the public yet huge in their presence, the kettles were waiting to be “woken up” and revealed. Percussion artist Diego Espinosa has performed the honor. The sound and image of his performance on January 13 were shown live two stories below in the WORM film space.

Brazil experience 1.

In March and April 2006 I worked with the NGO ‘Perola Negra’ (Black Pearl) in Joao Pessoa, the capital of the state of Paraiba in the North East of Brazil. For the first time in my life I organized workshops in drawing painting and mask making for kids between 5 and 17 who lived in the poor neighborhood ‘Cruz das Armas’. The experience was irreplaceable. I expected a team of educators but the NGO was only doing Capoeira and dance workshops at the time I arrived in Joao Pessoa. Without any experience I started a process of trial and error in organizing and running the workshops. In the end it was all worth it and the kids and myself were very happy with what we had learned. We worked with drawings based on Capoeira movements, the kids designed a logo using their own initials, they learned to mix primary colors and making their own pallet and with the Friday group we made masks resembling their favorite animals

Brazil experience 2.

Prowd kids are posing with the masks we made over a period of 6 weeks. Clockwise starting with the pig, we see a Dalmatian bear, a Phoenix, a dragon, a tiger, a butterfly and an elephant that lost its trunk.