A House for the Community

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A House for the Community
Een huis voor de gemeenschap Duration: 1996 – 2003 Location: Town Hall, Oud-Beijerland Participants: 9 artists and all employees of the town hall Visitors: people who used the town hall Number of Events: 9 As part of the construction of the new town hall of Oud-Beijerland in 1996, Van Heeswijk was asked to contribute a public sculpture. In close collaboration with the architect Victor de Leeuw, she constructed atmosphere zones she called ‘habitats’, which visualise what is going on in Oud-Beijerland in order to make the users of the postmodern building feel more at home. The four habitats are ‘the Polder’, ‘the Community’, ‘Collaboration’ and ‘Culture’. ‘Polder’ allowed for the creation of an inner garden that functions as a model for the current ecological management of the region, and in which the local Society for the Protection of the Hoeksewaards Landscape organizes talks and tours. An orchard – representing the historical, natural environment – was also planted outside the building, instead of the planned parking lot. For the habitat ‘Community’ an ‘engagement room’ was built. This special room had been overlooked in the new building’s design, because nowadays in the Netherlands, registrations of marriages, births and deaths are mostly processed at a town hall’s central information desk. In Oud-Beijerland, however, with a strict religious community still predominant, family matters are of great importance and thus a special, private room was needed where these intersections of personal life and bureaucratic procedure could take place. ‘Collaboration’ consisted of a new design programme for the information desks and the canteen, emphasizing the need for employees to learn more about each other and their work activities. Finally, in ‘Culture’, a four-year program was established, inviting artists to contribute a work to one of the habitats and to create interventions in the building’s architecture. All these habitats were incorporated in a specially designed sign-posting system. Making use of the existing budget allocated to the building process made it possible to take the project Een huis for the gemeenschap (A House for the Community) beyond the small amount of funding reserved for art, and it is still up and running today. The project was an intense process, not only working with the community to integrate an art project into their lives, but also devising an official city government structure in order to ensure it ongoing support. 1996, Oud-Beijerland

projects
De Strip/ Freehouse/ From the Sidelines/ Room with a view (Dissonance)/ Room with a view (Positioning)/ Room with a view (Real Stories from Life)/ Outside Livingroom/ I + the Other. Art and the Human Condition/ Until we meet again/ A House for the Community/ NEsTWORK/ State of Mind/ Break. Dance./ The Secret City/ The world is bigger than Schijndel/ Hotel New York P.S.1/ Valley Vibes. The Vibe-Detector/ Water walker/ Welcome Package Welcome Stranger/ A Christmas Pudding for Henry/ Under the Spell of the Ring/ Subway to the Outside/ Wish for a Coffee/ Acte de Présence - Sans Valeur/ Draw a line/ Raising a Ruckus/ Casco-Mobile/ Z.T. (Duurzame Versterkingskunst)/ A Paper House/ Face Your World/ Beyond ethics & aesthetics/ Room with a view/ Room with a view (Private)/ Room with a view (Annex)/ Room with a view (Longing)/ Room with a view (The Neighbour)/ The Office/ Casco, Coffee and Communication/ In the Field of Players/ The Dinner/ The Blue House/ Face Your World, StedelijkLab Slotervaart/ Dwaallicht (Will o the whisp)/ Works, Typologies and Capacities/ Some 7/ Ariadne/ Narratives of Desire/ An Sich/ Brain Storm/ Amnesia of a Landscape/ Care-Taker/ Fields of (inter)action/ Shelter-07/ Face Your World, Museumpark/ You and the City. Diaries of a Future Avant-garde/ Shanghai Dreaming, Holding an Urban Gold Card/ It runs in the Neighbourhood/ Talking Trash/ Buiten Post/ The Resistance of Small Happiness/ Public Faculty No. 1/

essays
Networks, faces, membranes/ Creative Urge, annex a Zeal for Improvement/ A House for the Community/ Principles of Hope/ Germinal/ Freehouse/ Conquest/ The Miracle of Gorinchem/ In The Field of Players/ The Artist as Versatile Infiltrator of Public Space/ Noem mij maar gewoon een portretschilder/

general
Jeanneworks/ Contact/ CV Jeanne van Heeswijk/

news
Exhibition 'Reality 10'55 Odense'/ 'Some 7' at exhibition in RAM/ New website Jeanne van Heeswijk online/ Lecture at the NAi, Rotterdam/ Design Staalmanpark receives green light/ Kunst RAI 2006: 'Games People Play, Chapter 1'/ Exhibtion: 'Play! The Art of the Game' / 'Narratives of Desire. Realities Odense' in Arnhem/ 'Cascomobile' at the Busan Biennale/ Project presentation 'Care-taker'/ Visiting Scholar at Hunter College NY/ KONTROL #1 is online now/ Lecture at the MCA in Sydney/ 'FYW' nominated for Citizen Participation Prize/ Exhibition 'Room with a View' at Axel Lapp Projects/ Lecture at Architectural Association in London/ Evasions of Power, Sesion 4: 'Interventions'/ Symposium DEAF07: 'Interact or Die!'/ 5 projects at the Architecture Biennale Rotterdam/ 'Socially Yours', Seminar Hong Kong/ Kunsthal: Presentation 'FYW Museum Park'/ Presentation 'Systems' and 'Works, 1993-2007'/ 'Ariadne' moves to Sint-Oedenrode/ 'Memory Knight' at Art Rotterdam 2008/ International presentation ´Systems´/ 'The Urban Game Show' at the NAI/ Premiere 'It runs in the Neighbourhood'/ 'Narratives of Desire' at Axel Lapp Projects/ Breakfast lecture at the Design Publico Week / Fields of (inter)action at Venice Biennale/ New work coming up at 2008 Shanghai Biennale/ The Market of Tomorrow/ Women beyond the Verge/ Public Faculty no.1/ RAM opens 2010 with Citizens' Tales/ Nominated for Award for Participatory Art/ Talking Trash 13 April - 29 May/ Publications Jeanne van Heeswijk for sale/