Tuinbazen presentation

The final presentation of Tuinbazen, a project by Irene Fortuyn and Ketter & Co which took place throughout 2019 in the Amstelpark to explore alternative forms of public management of the park, will take place during two weekends of February 15th to 23th, 2020. During this research the park visitors were involved with the park maintainance and the gardener in innovative ways.

Program in het Glazen Huis

Presentation and exhibition 15 – 23 February, friday- sunday 1-5 PM
The preliminary result of this research into the park as a collective garden can be viewed in Het Glazen Huis. Here you can see a new map of the Amstelpark with stories of its visitors, a video about their ‘ideal garden’ and engage in a diversity of interactive Amstelpark games and in depth presentations about the relationship between visitors and gardeners.

This exhibition is not only an overview of past year’s activities of the Tuinbazen but also a starting point to focus attention on human cohabitation with animals and plants in the city. How do we live with them and what do they mean for how we maintain our cities and parks? We use this exhibition as an inventory of this relationship’s effect on visitors, park maintenance and the current Tuinbazen research project.

Noor Bootsma and Laura Hoek will be present on the saturdays to collect animal stories with “The Story Miner”, a project with which Noor graduated early this year at the Design Academy in Eindhoven.

Park Dialogue and Excursion Saturdays, February 15 and 22 from 3 – 5 PM
Join us for a park dialogue with Irene Fortuyn to discuss the human relationship with plants and other species while thinking about the park as a collective garden. If you want to contribute to the future of the parks in Amsterdam you can participate and enroll in either of the dialogues.

4 PM IVN ecologist Arend Wakker will give a guided tour on the inhabitants of the park.

Photo by Jan Steenman

More about Tuinbazen

Tuinbazen is the result of the artistic research in the Amstelpark that Irene Fortuyn undertook first in 2016 on the invitation of Zone2Source, which developed into the exhibition De Tuin en De Tuinman in January 2017. This research was then expanded to other Amsterdam city parks. In 2019 Zone2Source invited Ketter&Co again to make the Amstelpark the test park to experiment with the project’s central thesis: can a prk be a collective garden?

With various activities, they bring the park visitors closer to the park and the people who take care of it. What is the nature and culture of the parks of Amsterdam? Who uses them and what for? Who takes care of the parks and how? And how visible is the gardener for the visitor of the park? These are some of the questions that guide the project Tuinbazen. For example, every month they present the maintenance tasks at the entrance of the Amstelpark and together with Zone2Source they organized several afternoons of rose pruning coordinated by the gardeners.

KETTER&Co strives towards involving and engaging gardeners, users and policymakers in order to create more horizontal forms of management, and in this way to increase the quality of the parks of Amsterdam. This is done through research on the usage of and care for the parks, the colors, smells, materials, flora and fauna, activities, languages, garbage, ways of communicating and parties in the park.

Throughout 2019 Tuinbazen has focused on the following activities:

Maintenance Calendar Amstelpark: A monthly calendar of maintenance activities which are executed in the Amstelpark was written on the ground close to the entrance of the park using chalk. It included references to specific locations in order to make the maintenance activities visible to all users of the park.

Flowers for the Mayor: Each month, a bouquet of flowers growing in the Amstelpark and other parks of Amsterdam will be sent to Femke Halsema, mayor of Amsterdam.

Waste Guirlands: KETTER&Co invited visitors and locals to pick up the trash that is being left behind in the park during their strolls. This waste was made into guirlands, who are on show next to the Rietveldhuis.

The Tuinbazen Activity Lorry: The Tuinbazen lorry is filled with activities and placed next to the Glazen Huis! Make sure to come by on a sunny afternoon to play Tuinbazen memory games or get creative in other ways! The Tuinbazen Lorry was also part of the We Make The City Festival. People from all over Amsterdam visited the Amstelpark and took part in special activities.

Cutting the Roses: During three sessions, visitors got a chance to cut the roses in the Amstelpark with the Tuinbazen. The Tuinbazen gave the volunteers the right directions, which allowed them to make the roses shine again. Many volunteers, including a high school class, were eager to help the Tuinbazen.

Cutting the Rhododendrons: As a part of the We Make The City Festival, volunteers were invited to cut the rhododendrons and get to know a little more about these plants in a fun way.

Broom Dialogues: Multiple dialogues will be held with Tuinbazen, policymakers, locals, visitors of the Amstelpark, academics, artists and others who have a perspective on the questions a park raises. The dialogues will take place according to the Socrates method, made by philosopher Humbert Schwab.