February 2018: Interviewing John Habraken
Honored to meet and interview John Habraken today, the Dutch architectural-theorist and pioneer of user-participation in mass housing. 90 years old but still on-point and dedicated to the cause! The interview will be part of the next Architecture City radioshow on “the changing dwelling” which Catja Edens, Teun van den Ende and myself are creating for Operator Radio to be broadcasted on 16th of March.
January 2018: Curator-in-residence ArtEZ Academy of Interior Architecture
Started the year as a curator-in-residence at the interior-architecture department of ArtEZ Institute of the Arts. Inspired by the theme Work, Body and Leisure the master-students had to create their own exhibition. After a difficult start, the students really pulled off some great works.
December 2017 – Architecture workshop Curitiba
Had a great and very productive workshop in Curitiba last week with the International New Town Institute. We worked hard with a great and smart team making plans for the improvement of the Caximba settlement, in the south of Curitiba, which has to deal with poverty, floodings, waste-problems and heavy poor housing situations. Worked on it together with Marco Vermeulen, Martin Sobota, Simone Rots, Rodrigo Bandino dos Santos, Daniela Tahira, Daniele Moreas, Camila Muzzillo, Mariana Kluppel Smijtingk, Jhessica Oliveira, Ana Laura Medeiros Cruz and Giulia Viana.
September 2017 – Design exhibition: For All By All, Toronto Canada
For All By All is the name of the exhibition that Agata Jaworska and myself curated for Toronto’s new design festival EDIT: Expo for Design, Innovation & Technology. It examines how we approach the commons in urban development today. It features nine projects as possible contributions to the discussion. Given that public goods matter, how do designers go about governing, making, maintaining, safekeeping and improving them? For All, By All is a collaboration between Bureau Europa, BRIGHT / The Cloud Collective (Thijs van Spaendonk & Gerjan Streng) and myself, with media programming and design by Design Displacement Group.
August 2017 – Launch Design Event: Bolo de Fubá
Bolo de Fubá is a design-project investigating Sao Paulo’s pastry-culture. Sao Paulo is considered one of the culinary capitals in the world with Alex Atala, Janaina Rueda and Rodrigo Oliveira as the city’s main culinary ambassadors. However, there is so much more gastronomy talent in parts of the city that are being overlooked. Small culinary entrepreneurs who create original and tasteful culinary designs on a daily basis.
Bolo de Fubá invites 15 pastry-chefs from all over town and has giving them the same recipe of the classic corn-cake. The chefs are challenged to create their version of Bolo de Fubá and tell their personal history with the cake. The project advocates creative talent in gastronomy, equality and above all the joy and comfort of the Brazilian classic cake.
July 2017 – EDIT: Dutch pavilion Toronto Designweek
Yes, we won! Bright – The Cloud Collective, Bureau Europa and This Must be the Place were chosen in a closed competition to design, curate and program the Dutch pavilion for the first Toronto Design Week: Edit. The fair will take place in the final week of September and the pavilion takes a closer look at the dilemas of innovation.
April 2017 – Continuing documentary on Max Risselada
Working hard on my documentary on Max Risselada, which brings us to London, Oxford and Prague. We visited and recording in two buildings by The Smithons and in the classic Villa Muller by Adolf Loos. Many thanks to Alice Masters for the camerawork. Coming to your theaters early 2018.
March 2017 – Interview Alice Vermeulen
Incredibly stoked to meet and interview Alice Vermeulen today in Tilburg. To Brazilians, Vermeulen is better known as Alice Pink Pank and became a Brazilian ‘80s pop-icon as the singer of the popular new wave band Gang 90 e as Absurdettes. A dramatic series of events, including the death of Gang 90’s lead singer & Alice’s former-boyfriend, Júlio Barroso, made her leave Brazil after 6 years. A bizar “Searching for Sugar Man-like”-story coming to your airways soon. Here’s a mix to some of her best works.
Februari 2017 – India Architecture Workshop
Back after three years in Mumbai India for a workshop on Curating Architecture, together with Max Risselada. Enjoyed it a lot! Great students, smart ideas and a lot of commitment. Thanks to KRVIA for hosting the workshop.
Februari 2017 – Recording Documentary on Max Risselada
Continuing my work on the documentary on Max Risselada, which brings us to Ahmenabad, India. We visited the incredible Mill Owners’ Association Building by Le Corbusier to discuss, amongst others, the Raumplan vs. Plan Libre exhibition and book. Many thanks to Avijit Mukul Kishore for the camerawork. Coming to your theaters end of 2017.
January 2017 – Around the World x All Around the Globe
My radioshow got nominated for best online world-music radioshow. Unfortunatlely we lost… but we are not sad about it because we lost to our friends from Around the World-radio from Paris, France. In January we joined forces to invite them to Amsterdam and did a great show together. Check it out here: https://www.mixcloud.com/RedLightRadio/all-around-the-globe-invites-around-the-world-paris-143-red-light-radio-02-07-2017/
January 2017 – Interview Thiago Franca
Rushhour Records asked me to curate and produce a series of podcasts on Brazilian Music, ranging from the interviews about music from the 60s to present day. The second podcast I did, was with Thiago Franca, saxophonist and bandleader from the band Meta Meta. I met up with Franca in a busy coffee joint downtown Sao Paulo for a talk on music, politics and living in the city. Listen to the interview here:
January 2017 – NTS Radio London
Remco and I were honored to play at NTS Radio live in London. For this occasion we did a special All Around The Globe show together with my buddy Rem Gow We’ve made a fine selection of the many previous shows we did for Red Light Radio.
December 2016 – Curating 5 days of radio for the Prince Claus Fonds
The Prince Claus Fund invited me to curate a special program for their 20th year anniversary. For this program I invited the Pan African Space Station (PASS) from Cape Town South Africa. PASS invited curators, artists, filmmakers, writers, and musicians together for discussion and performances at the OBA Amsterdam.
October 2017 -INTI Radio Quito
Flew to Quito, Ecuador this week with Michelle Provoost and Simone Rots for the UN Habitat III conference for the International New Town Institute. Apart from several programs in the main program, we have organised 4 hours of radio with talks on housing, living, new towns and many other subjects in collaboration with Ja Ja Ja Nee Nee Nee. Listen back to the podcasts here:
September 2017 – Interview Nara Leao
Rushhour Records asked me to curate and produce a series of podcasts on Brazilian Music, ranging from the interviews about music from the 60s to present day. The first podcast I did, was with Isabel Diegues, owner of the publishing house COBOGO, and daughter of the singer Nara Leao (1942 – 1989). Diegues spoke about here mothers life and carreer. Listen to the interview here:
July 2016 – HOBRA – Cultural program around the Rio Olympics
I have been appointed as curator on the HOBRA project for some months now. Its multidisciplinary cultural project around the 2016 Olympic Games, which will happen in Rio de Janeiro. From July 11th until 31st, artists from various areas – Brazilians and artists based in the Netherlands – will produce, in a collaborative way, works that investigate multidisciplinary questions, concepts and languages. Pairs will be formed, each composed by artists representing the two countries, with the duos being made of artists from the same segment: Literature, Film, Theater, Music, Dance, Design, New Media, Contemporary Art and Architecture. The project will not be closed in itself: the works coming from this exchange will be put together and presented in a big event open to the public, on the 31st of July!
June 2016 – Booklaunch “In Times of Complexity and Bewilderment”
Very proud to have initiated, coordinated and partly written the mini-book “In Times of Complexity and Bewilderment”. It was collectively written and produced in less than a month! In the book we took Lina bo Bardi’s ideas of Design in an Impasse and translated them to the contemporary practice. Contributions by Pedro Rivera, Nina Paim, Mariana Lanari, Marina Grinover, Saskia van Stein, Rieke Vos, Silvana Rubino, Zeuler R. Lima, Giancarlo Latorraca and Giacomo Pirazzoli. We launched the book at Stroom, Den Haag at the Lina Bo Bardi Fan Day.
March 2016 – Opening exhibition Claudy Jongstra – Ancient Light
Incredibly proud of my exhibition Claudy Jongstra Ancient Light. Over 500 people visited the opening which included a special interview inside the exhibition between Louwrien Wijers and Claudy. The exhibition will be shown till the end of 2016 so when you are in or around Leeuwarden, Friesland, make sure you visit it!
March 2016 – Experimenta 69: Holanda
About six months ago I helped a group of Spannish design professionals on a visit to Holland to meet with several Dutch designers. One of them was Pierluigi Cattermole, editor-in-chief of Experimenta, one of the leading design-magazines in Spain. Happy to see so many of my suggestions made it to the final magazine, including the suggestion to have the magazine designed by Haller Brun.
February 2016 – Lecturing at the University of Leiden on Brazilian cities & Brazilian architecture.
Lecturing at the University of Leiding as part of the Studium Generale on Brazilian Cities, Architecture and Design.
January 2016 – Curating exhibition: Claudy Jongstra, Fries Museum Leeuwarden, The Netherlands
Happy to start working on curating a largescale exhibition on new work of Claudy Jongstra for the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden, The Netherlands. The graphic design will be done by Irma Boom and the spatial design by Barend Koolhaas. Opening end of March 2016.
7 December 2015 – Lecture at What Design Can Do Conference, Sao Paulo, Brazil
What if architects & designers do more harm than good? This is what I wanted to talk about during my What Design Can Destroy! breakout session at the What Design Can Do conference. Speakers included Rohan Shivkumar, Simone Rots, Paula De Oliveira Camargo, Laura Sobral and Giancarlo Latorraca.
2 December 2015 – Lecture at iCities Conference, Curitiba, Brazil
Lecturing in Curitiba, Brazil, on smart cities and smart citizenship during the iCities Conference. Together with International New Town’s managing director Simone Rots we visited the city to set up an urban exchange between Curitiba and Almere.
November 2015 – Lecture on Interior Design at Studio X Rio de Janeiro
Lecturing in Studio X Rio de Janeiro, as part of the exhibition and workshop on interior-design, with a lecture on the history of interior design of the last 100 years.
November 2015 – Exhibition: Four Room Apartment with Walk-in-Closet
The exhibition which opened at the design-biennale in Florianopolis continued to be exhibited in Brazil. After being shown at MADE in Sao Paulo it continued to Rio de Janeiro, in a combined exhibition between Centro Carioca de Design & Studio X Rio de Janeiro. From 4 November till end of 28 January 2016.
November 2015 – Workshop: Four Room Apartment with Walk-in-Closet
Part of the exhibition-project Four Room Apartment with Walk-in-Closet was a four day workshop under the supervision of Renata Bartolomeu and Carolina Wambier. In cooperation with Paula de Oliveira Camargo and Pedro Rivera, 15 interior-architects designed four new rooms as the new exhibition design.
October 2015 – preparing What Design Can Destroy!
Preparing a special break-out session for the What Design Can Do conference in Sao Paulo. Subject is the challenging thought of What Design Can Destroy!
September 2015 – Teaching at de Reinwardt Academy, Amsterdam
Started teaching the course Strategies in Museumstudies for the Reinwardt Academy Amsterdam, part of the Amsterdam University of the Arts, for the Master’s course in Museology.
August 2015 – Opening exhibition 15/40 at MADE, Sao Paulo Brazil
The exhibition 15/40 was opened by the Dutch Minister of Education, Science and Culture, Jet Bussemaker. On her visit to Brazil, the Minister had special attention for Dutch Creative Industries in Brazil, including design.
August 2015 – Exhibition: 15/40: A Snapshot of Recent Dutch Design
The exhibition which opened at the design-biennale in Florianopolis continued to be exhibited in Brazil. The first stop was the design fair MADE, in Sao Paulo. Due to the limited available size I only chose to exhibit only 15 works of the total of 40.
July 2015 – Started working as part-time program-director for INTI, International New Town Institute, Almere, The Netherlands
The International New Town Institute (INTI) is a non-profit think-and-do-tank based in Almere, The Netherlands. INTI is dedicated to improving the quality of global urban development and has hired me to set-up a program between Almere and the Brazilian city of Curitiba, eventually leading to the worldwide Floriade-Expo in 2022.
May 2015 – Lecture Brazilian Design Biennale, Florianopolis, Brazil
During the opening of the Design Biennale I was asked to lecture on the future of design in general terms. The 40-minute presentation featured examples from history, present and future.
May 2015 – Exhibition: 5th Design Biennale Brazil – Palacio do Povo, Florianopolis, Brazil
After a year preparing, selecting and curating the exhibition for the 5th Design Biennale Brazil finaly opened. The project consisted of an exhibition featuring the works of 40 different Dutch designers, a site-specific work entitled JA! and a workshop during the opening between Dutch and Brazilian designers.
March 2015 – Opening Lelé Exhibition in Architecture Centre Hamburg + interviewing Max Risselada
The exhibition on the Brazilian architect Joao Figueras Lima – better known as Lelé – which I curated with Max Risselada and Giancarlo Latorraca, opened at the Architecture Centre in Hamburg. For the opening I interviewed Max on what makes the work of Lelé so interesting and fascinating.
Februari 2015 – Two new advisory jobs
This month I became official advisor for two cultural funding bodies. The first is the Rotterdamse Raad voor Kunst & Cultuur and the second one the National Raad voor Cultuur. Exhited about it.
14 December 2014 – Lecture at Het Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht, The Netherlands
Lecturing at the Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht, The Netherlands on Brazilian Encounters, where I focused on politics, sports, architecture and design.
26 August 2014 – Lecture at UNIVALE, Florianopolis, Brazil
Lecturing at the Univale University of Florianopolis with Nikki Gonnissen. Huge crowd of 250 students showed up! Nice to see such enthusiasm.
15 August 2014 – Lecture at MADE, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Lecturing at the Design Week in Sao Paulo. Together with Richard van der Laken, I gave a lecture on recent Dutch Design. We even made it into the papers.
01 April 2014 – New office, Amsterdam
This must be the Place has moved! I am now located in the heart of town. Prinsengracht 1, at the corner of the Brouwersgracht.
This Must be the Place 