Jan van Eyck Academie
Post-Academic Institute
for Research and Production
Fine Art, Design, Theory
Jan van Eyck Academie
Post-Academic Institute
for Research and Production
Fine Art, Design, Theory
Advising researcher: Wim Cuyvers
Researchers: Maartje Dros, Jacqueline Schoemaker, Jayme Yen, Jozua Zaagman
On 1 October 2007, a communal research project was started up by the Jan van Eyck Academie, Marres, NAi Maastricht, Academie Beeldende Kunsten and the Bonnefantenmuseum, about the area around the large Sphinx building in Maastricht and the urban development which is starting to be developed around there (the Belvédère project). The project is a result of the talks which the participating institutions have been having for quite a while now, about a communal vision on the cultural infrastructure (in the widest possible sense) in Maastricht.
Five researchers of the Jan van Eyck Academie, united in the Traces of autism team, will carry out the following research:
– doing a quick scan of the existing infrastructure within Maastricht and how this has developed over the last ten years;
– making a rough sketch of a vision of the desired cultural infrastructure of Maastricht (needs, wishes, dreams);
– creating a vision of how this could be ‘applied’ in the area around the large Sphinx building and the Belvédère project;
– finding out which other carriers or instruments, apart from city development, could be used strategically by the art institutes (for instance, Maastricht as Cultural Capital, about which there is open speculation);
– looking into possible best practices elsewhere.
The Traces of autism research team consists of: Wim Cuyvers (architect), Maartje Dros (spatial designer), Jozua Zaagman (spatial designer), Jacqueline Schoemaker (cultural scientist) and (possibly) Jayme Yen (graphic designer).
Over the coming months, a number of sessions and workshops will be organised, in which insights and ideas will be discussed and tested. The first research results were presented during the communal New Year’s drinks of the institutes involved, held in the NAi on 13 January 2008.
Traces of autism proposed to use the existing track to have a train running slowly and constantly between Belvédère Mountain and the river Maas, not actually arriving anywhere. This proposal will be further presented and debated on Wednesday 30 January.