Starting in January, we will open our doors every Saturday! You're welcome to visit our exhibition between 1:00 PM and 5:00 PM.

Now showing: the results from the fourth Ploegendienst. Read more about the program here.

Open on Saturdays!

The annual event Uitnacht Arnhem takes place on Friday, January 30th. We have a fantastic program again this year. City resident Frank Koolen will present Klei Café 'Just Friends' at Plaatsmaken.

During the two weeks around the Uitnacht, artworks from our depot will also be on display in various shops in Klarendal.

Get to know Frank Koolen's work during Uitnacht Arnhem (Cultural Night Arnhem). Between 16:00-20:00, you can come to create, participate, and exchange ideas!

In 2026, artist, teacher, workshop leader, and organizer Frank Koolen will be a city resident in Arnhem. He creates installations, videos, performances, drawings, and sculptures.

During Uitnacht, you can discover his project FIASCO TOTAAL at Plaatsmaken. Frank enjoys creating work for and with others and wants to share the joy he experiences in art with others. He believes that art in itself shouldn't be anything, but that it can serve as a beautiful starting point for social change or a different consciousness. His main motivation is his enthusiasm for the creative process as a catalyst for an open and empathetic perspective. Key ingredients for Frank are the use of humor, disruption, and improvisation.

In FIASCO TOTAAL, Frank Koolen's research, the creative process is central as a driving force for play, conversation, and new discoveries. It is a dynamic, experimental, and playful investigation into the ways and effects of collectivity, collaboration, and cooperation, in which the process and shared experience are key. The research findings will be presented at various locations, including Plaatsmaken and Omstand. The project consists of several components: STUDIO FIASCO, CIRCUS FIASCO, and FIASCO TOTAL.

The Arnhem City Atelier is a collaboration between Plaatsmaken, Theater aan de Rijn, ArtEZ, and The Hub. Frank Koolen began his residency at OMSTAND at the end of 2025. The project is made possible by the Municipality of Arnhem.

In addition, Het Modekwartier (Fashion Quater), in collaboration with Plaatsmaken, is presenting an art route through the Klarendal neighborhood during Uitnacht Arnhem. For two weeks, you can admire gems from the Plaatsmaken archive at various locations throughout the neighborhood. Be surprised by both the artworks and the businesses in Klarendal. The editions are made by various artists, all created in Plaatsmaken's workshops. The works can be seen from January 23rd to February 6th at participating locations in the neighborhood.

You can also see the results of the work of Ploegendienst 4 during the Uitnacht at Plaatsmaken.

Uitnacht Arnhem

Nu te zien: de resultaten van de vierde Ploegendienst, onderdeel van het programma H0ha. 

Ploegendienst 4 | Rizqita Naherta, Not Just a Collective & ROTS
Working period: September - December 2025
Winter Gather Together: 9, 12 and 13 December 2025
On show: January 5 - February 21 2026

Part of the H0Ha programme, curated by the Sunflower Soup collective for Plaatsmaken, Arnhem.

These are the results of the fourth work shift of the multi-year program H0Ha. In H0Ha, the workshops of Plaatsmaken are used to experiment with forms of protest and resistance, through images and language. Poets, visual artists, activists, and publishers are invited to collaborate at Plaatsmaken in so-called ‘Shifts’. H0Ha is curated by the Sunflower Soup collective.

Did you have a grandmother who knitted socks for you? Did she teach you how to do it? And do you have the patience for that time-consuming work?

Handicrafts, such as crocheting, knitting, and sewing, have traditionally been seen as work done by women. It is labor that is often performed at home or in small communities. The maker often remains unpaid and unnamed. This fits into a broader pattern in which women's work is made invisible. At the same time, this labor forms a basis for women to come together, organize, and emancipate themselves.

The Arnhem collective Not just a collective has transformed handicrafts into graphic work. It is precisely this translation that creates a new visibility that makes it possible to reflect on these aspects of handicrafts. Handicrafts are often seen as old-fashioned, but they also carry a history of subversion, resistance, and solidarity.

The artist Rizqita Naherta created an installation that refers to women's emancipation in Indonesia and the important role that the Gerwani movement played in it. This movement is an example of how different forms of emancipation and resistance come together and reinforce each other, because anti-imperialism and decolonization were central to Gerwani. The silkscreen prints feature texts from Gerwani's magazine Api Kartini, printed on images of kebayas (traditional Indonesian clothing for women).

In the practice of artist and poet ROTS, “unravelling” is an important method that is used in both a concrete and metaphorical way: wool from old jumpers is reused for objects with other purposes. A seemingly familiar concept such as “man” is unravelled in order to question what masculinity actually consists of. ROTS created a man cave printed with images of Androgel, a hormone treatment. How should a man behave in his cave? You are welcome to find out for yourself by taking place in the soft interior of this cave, which can also be seen as a manwomb.

What does it mean to pass on handworking techniques in the modern world? Who taught you how to crochet, knit or work with textiles? Did the women you knew mostly do this for leisure, or was it the only work available?

In this textile work, five members of Not Just a Collective — Lu Lin, Femke Kersten, Alessandra Varisco, Doga Gönüllü and Heike Renée de Wit — started from the knowledge and techniques they had learned from their grandmothers. They shared their crochet and knitting skills with each other and with their neighbours at De Nieuwe Hommel community centre. By combining stories and memories from their grandmothers, they translated textile crafts into prints. Using printing techniques such as silkscreen and monoprint, these images were printed onto textiles which were then pieced together. This patchwork is on display in the middle of Plaatsmaken's space. You cannot miss it! The work reminds us of the labour, knowledge and stories of our grandmothers, and of the value of these aspects, which should not be forgotten.

Merawat Api dari Penyihir-Penyihir Militan Kami - Nurturing the Fire of Our Militant Witches

Through the assemblage of archives reactivated from Gerwani’s magazine Api Kartini, the excerpts from the magazine are presented on the many kebaya prints and the bamboo mats within the living room space, as revolutionary passages, poem, and list were recited through the phone and television by exiled relative.

The work holds a space of remembrance for the militant women’s mass organization. Along with the pedagogical activation, the work asks to nurture the memories of Indonesian women’s resistance, and their methods of understanding that are organizing with the masses that is prone to be forgotten in the present, as a result of the historical trauma under Suharto’s regime.

hello I'm a performative male
my mancave is a womb
Dear Virginia, I'm now squatting the room, owning the room, making the room. The that became the (on steroids).

My body on testosterone feels more and more like my own, literally better, stonger. Was it only hormonal dysfunction? Did i just not have enough?

I know the moon, even so far away, was too much for me.

Do I feel more masculine because I'm taking testo or am I masculine and therefore I take testo?

masculinity is transforming
masculinity is tender and often fragile
masculinity relies on stories we tell about how men come into being.
Am I becoming a man by performing the same act again and again and again? I'm never quite reaching, quite being but probably for the better.

Gender is image perpetually cited, repeated, and reproduced. (J. Butler)
this mancave/womb gives shelter to ideas of performative masculinity exposing what Butler calls the machinery of becoming.
Becoming by performing.

my manwomb - an ode to my muses: the matchamen, the soyboys, the softbois, the metromen, the dandies and the hipsters.Onderdeel van het programma H0Ha, gecureerd door collectief Sunflower Soup voor Plaatsmaken, Arnhem.

Now showing | Ploegendienst 4

Plaatsmaken is closed for the holidays between December 17 and January 5.

During our Christmas holiday, we will be closing our doors. We are preparing for a new year full of experimentation, art, activism, and other wonderful projects! We look forward to welcoming you back on Monday, January 5.

TIP
To visit during the holiday: STUDIO FIASCO at OMSTAND

On view from December 13, 2025 through January 11, 2026.
Open to the public every Saturday and Sunday from 12:00 PM to 5:00 PM.

Plaatsmaken is closed

Plaatsmaken has been showcasing contemporary visual art in the display case in front of the Palace of Justice in Arnhem for several years now. This is based on the idea that encountering art in unexpected places can add a touch of sparkle to your day.

In collaboration with the BEAR (Fine Art) department at ArtEZ, current and former students will have the opportunity to submit a proposal for the showcase. This benefits both parties: young artists gain experience exhibiting, and Plaatsmaken is thus assured of programming young talent directly from the academy.

On display in the showcase from January 9th: People on the Street, by Chenxin Feng

De Uitspraak

Plaatsmaken supports the cultural boycott of Israel.
Dutch and Belgian artists and institutions have united in a collective boycott of Israel, as they no longer wish to stand by in the face of these atrocities.

They speak out for the freedom of Palestine and against the genocide that is being ignored by so many governments. The signatories will no longer participate in art projects funded by the Israeli government (or complicit institutions), nor will they enter into new collaborations with such parties.
They also refuse to take part in initiatives that treat Israeli and Palestinian perspectives as "equal" without addressing the history of oppression and injustice. Exempt from the boycott are organizations that are not complicit in violations of international law and that have unequivocally spoken out against the genocide, the occupation (legally declared illegal), and apartheid.

The boycott is explicitly not directed at individuals or their backgrounds—this includes Jewish people or Israelis as such—but at the complicity of Israeli institutions and companies in human rights violations against Palestinians.

Join the boycott: cultureleboycotisrael.nu

Cultural Boycott Israël

Project in the Neighbourhood; 'Kleurendal', utility boxes completely refurbished.

The Klarendal neighborhood has once again become a little more beautiful. With the completion of the Kleurendal project, 23 utility boxes in the area have been adorned with vibrant designs by graphic designer Harmen Liemburg. Inspired by stories from local residents and the unique character of the Fashion District, the artworks bring a colorful boost to the streetscape.

The project builds on an earlier series of 24 decorated boxes from 2023, when Liemburg collaborated with pupils from primary school Kunstrijk (Ogensnoep project). For this new series, he once again ventured into the neighborhood, this time together with community concierges Eric and Perry. During visits with residents, he captured their living environment, collected objects, animals, and figures from popular culture, and combined patterns and clothing styles. He then translated these into a cohesive design in his own signature style. By highlighting visual elements characteristic of Klarendal, the work seamlessly reflects the neighborhood’s identity. In addition, the beautification of the utility boxes helps to discourage littering and vandalism in public space.

Commissioned by the Municipality of Arnhem, the project is a collaboration between Plaatsmaken, residents, local organizations, and the artist, showcasing what becomes possible when art, community, and urban space reinforce one another.

On October 18th, a festive opening walk took place. The walk included a selection of the embellished electrical cabinets. Designer and artist Harmen Liemburg was present to explain his work. The walk was part of our Autumn Gather Together 

https://www.google.com/maps/d/embed?mid=1yf4nRjbTtg8XLxEY3vXX0ALpQAznVyo&ehbc=2E312F

Photo credits: Harmen Liemburg / Django van Ardenne

Utility boxes designed by Harmen Liemburg

In the display case in front of the Palace of Justice in Arnhem, Plaatsmaken has been programming contemporary visual art for a number of years. This is based on the idea that encountering art in unexpected places can add an extra sparkle to your day.

On display in the showcase from 1 July: Ouiee SY Park, 'The House with a Green Old Roof'

The images by artist Ouiee SY Park, which are now on display in the showcase in front of the Palace of Justice, come from her video work The House with a Green Old Roof, a personal search for Park's grandmother and the way in which their family was shaped by life in a metropolis.

Ouiee SY Park recently lost her grandmother, who is central to the images. This work therefore becomes a memoriam. By sharing these images in the showcase, Park symbolically invites her grandmother to Arnhem, her new home, where she tries to take root and flourish — as her grandmother once did under the green old roof of her house.

Watch the film from which the images come here.

In collaboration with the BEAR (Fine Art) department of ArtEZ, (former) students are given the opportunity to submit a proposal for the showcase. This is good for both parties: young artists gain experience in exhibiting and Plaatsmaken is thus assured of programming young talent straight from the academy. 

Plaatsmaken publishes the magazine Zevenblad twice a year, featuring contributions to poetry and visual art. Submissions for the ninth edition of Zevenblad are now open.

This December, we will present the ninth issue of our poetry and visual arts magazine. As always, we will do so during a festive gathering where poets will read and artists will explain their work.

There is no theme; the editors will select a coherent collection from the submissions following an Open Call. Werkplaats Typografie will handle the design. Zevenblad #9 will be published in December in an edition of 100 copies. The deadline for submissions is November 1st. Please note: only WORD files will be considered for poetry, and JPEG files for images. Send your work to  uitgeverij@plaatsmaken.nl.

Zevenblad #9

On Thursday September 18th and Saturday September 20th the Autumn Gather Together (Herfstsamenscholing) will take place. 

"Total let go cathartic healing pleasure activist transformative release dance party"

Come dance and celebrate the results of the third Ploegendienst, in which Moni Zwitserloot, Hussel Zhu and the Feministische Handwerkpartij have been cooperating. Apart from various etching experiments and seemingly out of nowhere, they developed a music video that functions as a releaser for hidden and oppressed energies. This release can be seen as a critique of normative and patriarchal structures, but also as a way to reclaim and even celebrate ageing, screaming, and orgasmic ugliness. Apart from this, you are also very welcome to join the various workshops.

We are letting go of the traditional idea of an exhibition with a clear beginning and end. Instead, this year we are organizing shifts of artists, writers, and collectives. Each season, activities are brought together in a festive Gather Together, driven by artistic and social experiment. For this program, we are collaborating with the artist collective Sunflower Soup (SFS) and program maker Lenn Cox. SFS created the program H0Ha and Lenn Cox developed Time Out / Tune In. The Hospitality Club provides educational and public activities alongside the program. You can find more about H0Ha and Time Out / Tune In here.

Program Autumn Gather Together (all events are free)

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 18
16:00 | Kleurendal
Walk through Klarendal along a selection of electrical boxes designed by Harmen Liemburg for Plaatsmaken. The project, commissioned by the Municipality of Arnhem, is a collaboration between Plaatsmaken, residents, local organizations, and the artist. Informal drinks at Plaatsmaken afterwards.
17:00 | Workshop Cannibal Cats by Sunflower Soup
In this workshop, you can really speak your mind while creating an edible zine. This is your chance to be deliciously catty - give your inner killjoy free rein, dig your claws in, let your hair stand on end. Together we’ll create texts, drawings, and prints, while swallowing each other’s frustrations and worries - only to collectively digest them in the end.
All concerns are beautiful!
17:30 | Equinox Soup

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 20
12:30 – 14:30 | Workshop Blues & Rage by Periphery Center
During this workshop we dive into the language, colour and sound
of political disappointment and anger, by reading, writing, listening & cyanotype printing. You can find more information on the workshop here. 
12:30 – 14:30 | Drop-in workshop MONOMILL by Hospitality Club
Monoprinting workshop
14:30 | Cosy Food Break
15:30 | Opening: Total let go cathartic healing pleasure activist
transformative release dance party
17:30 | Autumn Soup, cocktails and more Partying!

Moni Zwitserloot is a writer and performer. Key elements in their work include physicality, transformation, and community. Being strange, muck, or weird is celebrated through the use of gore elements and magical realism. Current obsessions: insects, fungi and bodily fluids.

Hussel Zhu is a visual artist, short fiction writer, and researcher. In his printmaking, he often uses the image of a dancing frog—inspired by the Japanese ink painting Birds, Beasts, and Human Play, and the animal paintings of Bada Shanren—where animals satirize those in power.

The Feministische Handwerkpartij is a political feminist artist movement that is dedicated to studying, repairing, speaking, patching up, unlearning and mending. It is initiated by visual artist Emmeline de Mooij and performance director Margreet Sweerts.

Periphery Center is a collective for artistic practice and shared study. They meet to inspire one another and co-create the reality they dream of through bookmaking, graphic design, publishing, curating, art and writing. Periphery Center consists of Leana Boven, Pelumi Adejumo, Yusser Al Obaidi, Jeanine van Berkel en Yessica Deira.

For our small-scale educational projects, we collaborate with Hospitality Club, consisting of Mirka Farabegoli and Krista Burger. These projects involve local primary schools, young people, children, ArtEZ students, MBO students, and neighborhood residents.

With thanks to the Mondriaanfonds and the Municipality of Arnhem.

Autumn Gather Together

We are letting go of the traditional idea of an exhibition with a fixed beginning and end. Instead, we organize Ploegendiensten (residencies) for artists, writers, and collectives.

Every season features a Gather Together Week, during which activities are united into a vibrant whole of artistic and social experiment. For this program, we work with artist collective Sunflower Soup and program maker Lenn Cox.
The second Gather Together Week (Summer Gather Together) took place during the week of 21–29 June. The results of this second Ploegendienst and Gather Together will be on view until mid-September.

Ploegendienst 2 | Periphery Center & Girls Like Us
Working period: April/May/June 2025
Summer Gather Together: 21 - 29 June 2025
Open to visit: 30 June - 5 September 2025

About the Ploegendienst
Collective Periphery Center researched during their residency (Ploegendienst) how the collective can be a space for ideas, desires and gatherings within the current social and political landscape. Spiralling around the question what conditions make collectives possible and how, like the body, this is changeable: it can transform, grow older and develop different needs.

Periphery Center invited publishing collective Girls Like Us to join them from their years of experience to deepen this process and work together towards a public workshopping sweatpants session on Sunday June 29. Read more about this session FROM THE MARGIN TO THE SEAM in the program.

During their working period at Plaatsmaken, Jeanine van Berkel, Yusser al Obaidi, Yessica Deira, and Pelumi Adejumo of Periphery Center explored what it means to work collectively. Rooted in shared diasporic experience, they wrote, played, and experimented with cyanotype, silkscreen, and graphic design. Working with silkscreen and print became, for them, a journey of return, a repetition, a movement between presence and disappearance. Each print holds an echo of something that once was, but never returns quite the same. The blur in pigment and the rhythm of layering speak to memories of a land, a place, a time. Faded and resurfacing, again and again. In Yoruba culture, indigo is the color of love. The patterns and shapes throughout the space echo traditional Nigerian textile dyeing techniques. Once both sacred material and currency, indigo carried deep cultural meaning. Through symbolic motifs and patterns, a visual language emerged used to convey messages on clothing, express status and the bonds between people.

The collaborative process of Periphery Center is embedded in their work. One begins, another holds the grid, someone else completes the line or fills in the color. The piece moves between hands, like memory: shared, shifted, held. Phonetic similarities across languages create poetic bridges across cultures. Throughout the space, the word refugee/visitor in both Arabic (Laje’) [لاجئ] and Yoruba (Àlejò) are referenced. Inspired by the root structure of the Arabic language, you find motifs derived from the root ل ج ء • (l j ʔ) 1. related to refugeprinted on plaid plastic bags. Informed by thinkers like Édouard Glissant, they engaged in conversations about what it means to come from a place where you are always a guest, always arriving, always returning. How this movement might, over time, become a form of grounding instead of mourning.

The color blue carries more than nostalgia or tradition. Their visual language draws on the faded blue posters of old travel agencies, once vibrant, now ghosted by time, their original tones erased. Periphery Center draws inspiration from the design and visual cultures of the Global South, aesthetics often dismissed as kitsch or amateur by the standards of Western modernism. Here, these visual languages are, similar to the many languages underneath their tongues, celebrated and reimagined as Vernacular Diasporic Design: layered, hybrid, and resonant.

This working period (Ploegendienst) is part of the Time Out / Tune In program that program maker Lenn Cox has curated around Plaatsmaken's shared household. Time Out / Tune In connects the cyclical nature of time and its seasons, with a call to slow down! The program explores with multiple generations how we can organize together, what we can learn from each other and what is at stake in the cultural field and beyond. Dancing through chosen families, kindred spirits and ancestral matters. 
Read more about the program Time Out / Tune In.

Periphery Center is an emerging collective for artistic practice and shared study. Here, we center the margin as the main site for the production of a counter hegemonic discourse that is not just found in words but in habits of being and in the way one lives.* Here, we meet to inspire one another and co-create the reality we dream of through bookmaking, (graphic) design, publishing, curating, art and writing.

*bell hooks, “Marginality as site of resistance”

Girls Like Us is a queer feminist magazine made by and featuring an ever expanding community of queers from all sides of the spectrum within the arts, culture and activism. The magazine was founded by Jessica Gysel. It mixes politics with pleasure and maps collaborative routes toward a non-patriarchy. To actively build community, Girls Like Us also organizes events ranging from film screenings, exhibiti­ons, talks, workshops, presentations, pop-up shops, to parties. Katja Mater is involved as editor.

Lenn Cox
Lenn Cox is a community organizer, artist, educator, and program maker. She explores solidarity economies by immersing herself in self-organized environments for learning, working, and living—many with an ecofeminist and queer core. She uses clothing and navigation cards to carry the exchanges and stories she gathers. Lenn initiates gatherings that enable collective learning. This is an ongoing research into how we organize ourselves, what we can learn from each other, and what is at stake in the cultural field and beyond. 

Now showing | Ploegendienst 2

In this workshop, we dive into the language, colour and sound of political disappointment and anger.

By reading queer, feminist and Black manifestos, we discuss how we can feel and express ourselves without censorship, and how we can use our anger (and rage) to imagine new ways of living and being in the world. We give shape to our anger by writing our own manifestos.

The reading and writing session will be followed by a listening session, featuring a collectively compiled playlist. As sound moves our bodies, we will translate our feelings into images through cyanotype: a printing technique that combines sunlight and indigo.

Creating an imprint of something that does not want to be forgotten, made visible in light.

Everyone is welcome to join! Please register via lenn@plaatsmaken.nl so we can take that into account when preparing for the workshop. English and Dutch will be the main languages spoken during the workshop.

Periphery Center is an emerging collective for artistic practice and shared study. Here, we center the margin as the main site for the production of a counter hegemonic discourse that is not just found in words but in habits of being and in the way one lives.* Here, we meet to inspire one another and co-create the reality we dream of through bookmaking, (graphic) design, publishing, curating, art and writing. Periphery Center is based in Rotterdam and consists of Leana Boven, Pelumi Adejumo, Yusser Al Obaidi, Jeanine van Berkel en Yessica Deira.

This workshop is part of the Herfstsamenscholing.

Workshop Blues & Rage

In collaboration with the BEAR (Fine Art) department at ArtEZ, (former) students will have the opportunity to submit a proposal for the display case. This benefits both parties: young artists gain experience exhibiting, and Plaatsmaken is thus assured of programming young talent straight from the academy.

On display in the showcase from October 3: Abse-n-ce, by Arya Rambod

A world of thresholds in which history falls into the present, and the present breaks into the future.

only the pieces of a past breaking like an earthquake,

seeping into our joints, dehydrating them.

We had asked for a world without judgment, a world unmanageable. An error, a desire, a like.

Now, there are only the broken pieces of history, present, and future, dispersed, awaiting.

Asian Movie Night is hosting an evening at Plaatsmaken featuring four short films, curated by Malika Mukhamejan. The program will be complemented by the cinematic performance "Lady of Heaven" by Darya Andijan and a reflective drawing workshop.

Tremors Beneath the Surface: Women's Voices from Central Asia is the title of the annual program of Asian Movie Night. A program that brings together feature films, short films, and experimental works from Central Asia and its diasporas, sketching a layered portrait of women’s lives. The films are not connected by a single storyline, but by the vibrations beneath them: silence that transcends generations, memories that interrupt the present, endurance woven into the textures of the everyday.

On November 6, Asian Movie Night and the QYZQARAS Film Festival present at Plaatsmaken:
Short Programme Part II — Echoes and Traces: Experimental Cartographies of Love, Loss, and Memory.

In this section, film language itself becomes a site of resistance. Diaries, myths, landscapes, and absences take the place of linear narratives, allowing the unspoken and unseen to emerge. Queer intimacy persists despite silence and distance; maternal history returns through myths; a threatened lake speaks through poetry; and the textures of a single day transform into a meditation on healing. Together, these films create alternative cartographies of identity and survival — fragments and traces that resonate where words fall short.

The following four short films will be screened:

1. Kündelık.Almaty / Aiganym Mukhamejan / Kazakhstan / 2024 / 11’
Kündelık.Almaty begins with Aiganym Mukhamejan’s spontaneous decision to film her day in Almaty, Kazakhstan. With camera in hand, she captures her personal encounters and the vibrant energy of her surroundings. The result is a cinematic diary: moments of reflection along the river, lively scenes at local bazaars, and a meaningful visit to a healer. Through her lens, we see a day of discovery and personal growth — an intimate portrait reflecting both the city’s heartbeat and her inner world.

2. Voiceless / Saadat Sataeva / Kyrgyzstan / 2025 / 15’
Voiceless is an essay film about a long-distance relationship between two young women — one in Ukraine, the other in Kyrgyzstan. Their faces remain hidden. The camera turns to their everyday surroundings: quiet houses, passing landscapes, traces of their presence. Their bond unfolds through text messages and silent phone calls, where emotions are felt in pauses, glances, and what remains unspoken. The result is a tender meditation on queer love, separation, and silent forms of communication that endure despite distance and invisibility.

3. Lady of Heaven / Darya Andijan / Netherlands / 2024 / 9’
A journey through the heavens on a flying carpet with Darya Andijan and her grandmother, newly released from a concentration camp in Xinjiang, China. As they float, the carpet transforms into a tapestry of Sumerian myths, dreams, and fragmented memories, intertwining the past and present of maternal history in Turkestan.

4. Balqaş Jyry / Artcom / Kazakhstan / 2025 / 19’
In this video essay dedicated to Lake Balqaş, the artists of the Artcom collective use the form of epic poetry (zhyr) and the tradition of qazaqylyq to depict the deep bond between humans and nature — a bond fractured by colonialism, industrialization, and ecological violence. Their aim is to give the lake back its voice and power: its capacity for resistance, its right to restoration, and its future.

Performance by Darya Andijan: Lady of Heaven

Lady of Heaven is a 15-minute expanded cinema piece featuring a solo performance by artist Darya Andijan. In it, she attempts to hold a phone conversation with her imprisoned grandmother — both within and outside the film.

A hands-on workshop exploring the concept of Asianness through the lens of Asian cinema. Film is used as a catalyst to question and reshape cultural identity. Participants work with iconic scenes, objects, and moments from films, creating experimental visual responses — doodles, sketches, and compositions — that reflect their impressions and experiences. As part of the Asian Movie Night Seasonal Festival, participants are invited to reimagine the boundaries of Asiannessthrough color, texture, and form, turning fleeting film images into personal visual definitions of culture.

18:30 Doors open
19:00 Introduction
19:05 – 20:10 Short Film Program Part II, Experimental Cartographies of Love, Loss, and Memory
20:10 – 20:25 Performance by Darya Andijan
20:25 – 21:00 Drawing Workshop Scene & Seen

€4.00 (Student rate €2.00)
Reservations via info@plaatsmaken.nl

Malika Mukhamejan is curator en filmmaker die diverse stemmen in de Centraal-Aziatische cinema belicht, met een focus op vrouwenrepresentatie en gemeenschapsvorming via film. Mukhamejan is oprichter van QYZQARAS, een filmfestival in Almaty dat zich richt op vrouwelijke filmmakers.

QYZQARAS is een onafhankelijk platform en jaarlijks filmfestival in Almaty (Kazachstan) dat in 2023 is opgericht. Het festival versterkt vrouwenstemmen in de cinema, met bijzondere aandacht voor Centraal-Azië. Het festival bevraagd dominante narratieven, ondersteunt nieuwe makers  en bied ruimte aan ondervertegenwoordigde perspectieven via filmvertoningen, gesprekken en educatieve projecten. Het motto — “women’s perspectives through the lens of cinema”— weerspiegelt de toewijding aan feministische curatoriële praktijken en de opbouw van een transnationale gemeenschap van kunstenaars, denkers en publiek.

Asian Movie Night (AMN) is een diasporisch filmplatform in Nederland. Het werd opgericht als directe reactie op het structurele gebrek aan Aziatische representatie in de Nederlandse cultuursector. AMN brengt radicaal andere verhalen en esthetieken naar een breed publiek, in samenwerking met diverse culturele instellingen. Met een interdisciplinaire aanpak die film, beeldende kunst, design en gesprekken samenbrengt, daagt AMN het idee van 'Asianness' uit door landsgrenzen en vaste identiteiten te doorbreken.

Darya Andijan is geboren in de Oeigoerse regio en gevestigd in Nederland. Haar werk verweeft mythen, poëzie en familiegeschiedenis om onderdrukking en koloniale uitwissing te bevragen. Met film, performance en schrijven reconstrueert zij gefragmenteerde geschiedenissen en versterkt zij vrouwenstemmen in Centraal-Azië. Zo creëert zij plekken waar vergeten geschiedenissen herinnerd en opnieuw verbeeld worden.

Asian Movie Night

Now on view: the results of the third Ploegendienst, part of the H0ha program.

Ploegendienst 3 | Moni Zwitserloot, Hussel Zhu & de Feministische Handwerkpartij
Work period: June – September 2025
Autumn Gather Together: 18 – 20 September 2025
On view: 22 September – 5 December 2025

H0ha is a program in which poets, visual artists, activists, and publishers are invited to (co-)work in so-called “Ploegendiensten” (Shifts) at Plaatsmaken.
Each season concludes with a Gathering Together, during which activities are brought together into a vibrant mix of artistic and social experiment.
For this program, we collaborate with the artist collective Sunflower Soup and curator Lenn Cox. The Autumn Gather Together took place from 18 to 20 September.

Ololyga is an Ancient Greek word that refers to the 
high-pitched, horrifying, blood-curdling screams of a woman*. 
These are sounds that are emitted during intense pain or intense pleasure.

The overarching theme of this Ploegendienst is how the body can serve as a space for resistance. This resistance is not bombastic and in-your-face as we are perhaps accustomed to, but rather modest, subtle and subversive. Through etchings, textiles, prints, texts and other interventions in the space, the artists demonstrate how they challenge societal norms and celebrate bodies, both human and non-human, that do not conform to the status quo. These works demand the viewer's attention and concentration, inviting them to engage with them, participate, question them, and adjust their own expectations.

In her essay 'Gender of Sound', Anne Carson describes how special festivals were held in classical Greek culture where women could make these sounds outside the city limits, the domain of civilised men. Men, who use reason as a barrier to keep emotions at bay, want nothing to do with people who leak on all sides. The person with two 'mouths', one above and one below. One with which unspeakable things are done, and one with which unspeakable things are said. With all their frightening, uncontrollable physicality and bodily fluids, this person is closer to the animal kingdom than to the world of developed humans, oh oops, cisgender men.

The etchings by Emmeline de Mooij (Feministische Handwerk Partij), featuring the figure of Sheela Na Gig, illustrate this very directly. We see an old body that is as much vulva as mouth, with hands that spread the genitals open. This figure was often carved in stone and placed on buildings, primarily medieval churches in Ireland. The reason for this is unclear, but what we do know is that the figure predates Christianity. They were considered a witch-like figure associated with twilight, transition and transformation. Embodying death as much as life. Through Sheela Na Gig, Emmeline questions current issues, such as who can claim ownership of their sexuality. Is it reserved for young bodies? Why are we not surprised when an older man displays his sexuality, yet turn up our noses when an older woman does the same?

In their text 'Vruchtvlees', Moni Zwitserloot offers a different perspective on the body. They employ the horror trope of 'gore' to challenge our perception of what the body can experience. Moni began by asking whether it is possible to make etchings using bodily fluids. This then gave rise to their text. Drawing inspiration from the everyday sensation of pulling a piece of skin off your fingernail, the text takes us on a journey of sensations that far surpasses this experience. The text can be read on the back of the prints, which hang gracefully from thin chains suspended from the ceiling.

Drawing inspiration from the Japanese Chōjū-giga scrolls, in which monkeys, frogs, and rabbits take on human roles, Hussel Zhu employs the frog (or toad) as a subtle means of criticising contexts in which political expression is suppressed. His etchings are like a 'knife in water': sharp yet restrained. We see frogs in many guises: disguised as bodhisattvas (in some forms of Buddhism, this is a being striving for enlightenment), nailed in the corner like a curse on a piece of paper, or hanging from the willow branch of Guanyin, the goddess of mercy. At the back of the room is a large piece of work in which a frog is surrounded by yellow and gold lines. These colours are associated with power in China. Visitors are invited to challenge the concept of power itself by leaving their mark on the work. 

Visitors are also challenged by the work of Margreet Sweerts (Feministische Handwerkpartij). White flags bearing etchings in the corners stand motionless in the space. This piece awaits activation by two people. They want to feel the resistance of the air and serve as an extension of the bodies that set them in motion. The piece calls for movement together and stems from the question: what do we surrender to? Do we submit to harsh forces that squeeze all humanity out of us? Or do we surrender to a society that seeks to render disabled, feminine, queer and trans bodies invisible?

The white flag is often considered taboo in contemporary activism, particularly when used by white people from a Western perspective. However, if you look closely or hold the flags in your hands, you will see that they are not actually white. They have a tactile history. They are not passive; they call for connection and reflection on the body of the person wearing them. While you are in the Plaatsmaken space, you might like to ask another visitor to accompany you outside, where you can tie the flags together and experience how the wind plays with the fabric.

The four participants have collectively made a music video based on their shared experience of the suppression of raw energy. In the video, they allow the sounds inside them at that moment to come to the fore. Is this perhaps a modern version of ololyga? Do we still feel uncomfortable expressing these kinds of sounds? Are they permitted within the city limits?

*In this day and age, 'woman' could refer to anyone who does not identify as a cisgender man. A cisgender person is someone whose gender identity corresponds to their birth sex.

Now showing | Ploegendienst 3

On October 11th we'll be monoprinting on textiles, in the patch making workshop 'Monomill II' by Hospitalityclub.

This workshop is part of a larger plan to develop special sails for our neighbours from windmill De Kroon.
You're invited to join us in brainstorming and designing! During this workshop, you’ll create stencils that we’ll use to print on fabric with monoprint techniques, ecological inks, and leftover materials. Hospitality Club will photograph your designs and include them in their image archive. You're welcome to take your printed patches home with you.

INFORMATION
When | Saturday, 11 October, between 12:00 and 16:00
Entry | Free, open to all – drop in any time

Want to secure a spot? Please register by emailing info@plaatsmaken.nl, mentioning Workshop Mono Mill II – 11 October.

Educational projects in collaboration with Plaatsmaken
Hospitality Club is an artist initiative by Mirka Farabegoli and Krista Burger. Over the past years, they have developed various projects in collaboration with Plaatsmaken.
In 2023 and 2024, they realized two larger initiatives, including a flag project with students from Ibn-i Sina primary school. The children used different printmaking techniques to decorate fabrics. These flags now hang at more than fifty local shops and are used during events. With these projects, they focus on collaboration with schools and other community partners. For 2025, they're working on a new project centered around the sails of windmill de Kroon.

Monomill II | Patch making Workshop

New workshops are planned for the upcoming months.

Have you always wanted to learn how to screen print or etch? Or do you want to learn how to work with analogue photography? You can sign up for the following workshops:

Friday 21 november | Workshop screen printing (beginners)
Sunday 30 november | Workshop Pinhole photography

Read more about the workshops and how to register here.

Worshops November

Join us for a screen printing workshop on Friday November 21st, you can still sign up!

Have you always wanted to learn screen printing? Or do you want to refresh your knowledge of the technique and basic skills? Then come to our screen printing workshop on November 21st.

Introduction to Screen Printing Workshop
This workshop is suitable for beginners with no prior screen printing experience. In one afternoon, you will get acquainted with the basics of screen printing, including the technique and printing process. Together with other participants, you will work on creating a collaborative image. All aspects of the printing process will be covered, such as preparing a screen, working with inks, and setting up your screen printing table. You will also learn how to handle the tools and materials involved.
This workshop is taught by Liedeke Taen.

Price: €110 per person (including materials and VAT)

You can register via the sign-up button next to this text, or send an email to info@plaatsmaken.nl

Screen printing workshop

Plaatsmaken welcomes two new members to its Supervisory Board: Ralph Dassen and Ide André.

With the arrival of Ralph Dassen, and following the departure of Jenny Doest, we once again have an experienced cultural leader from Arnhem on board. In addition, we chose to appoint an extra member with an artistically driven perspective, and we’re delighted to welcome artist Ide André as a new Plaatsmaker. We’re excited to introduce them both — and look forward to the collaboration!

“I’m a visual artist and have been living and working in Arnhem for over ten years. My work originates primarily from painting but increasingly extends into sculpture, performance, video, and sound. Alongside my own practice, I’m one of the regular studio practice tutors in the Fine Art department at AKI ArtEZ in Enschede.

My interest in graphic techniques stems from my background in painting — they’re often direct, physical methods. I also have a fondness for spaces and initiatives that create opportunities to come together: to think, act, and especially make, collectively. Plaatsmaken is one of those places where all this converges. I’m therefore very happy to be able to support that from within the Supervisory Board, wherever needed.”

“I always think there is a mystical understanding between the moon and the street,
like between two sisters who have grown old together
and no longer need any language to communicate with each other.”
— Tove Ditlevsen

“That feeling — that something speaks without words — I recognize it.
In art. In poetry. In silence.
In the way a thought, an image, or a glance suddenly opens something up
and for a moment connects everything.

I’m Ralph Dassen, director of Focus Filmtheater Arnhem,
father of two boys, and three years deep into that one book
that stubbornly refuses to move past thirty thousand words.
I like to move between worlds — between word and image,
between practical organization and losing myself in dreams.

I love art that dares to get lost,
language that both stings and soothes,
colors that are just a bit too bright,
and makers who can’t be tamed.

That’s why I feel at home at Plaatsmaken:
a place where artists experiment, fail, shine —
where things are born that don’t yet have a name.

As a new board member, I hope to contribute to creating space —
space to make, to doubt, to explore.
Space where art and poetry can keep breathing.

And yes — always with a cup of coffee nearby.

I look forward to meeting you all soon, and to truly becoming a Plaatsmaker!”

Nieuwe leden RvT

On the 18th & 20th of September, the Autum Gather Together took place.

Koen Kievits and Django van Ardenne photographed the Autumn Gather Together, and Plaatsmaker Maurice captured everything on video. You can view the footage at the bottom of this page.

Autumn had just begun to change the colors. In the soft September light, we celebrated the transition into the new season. On Thursday, we walked through Klarendal to see the utility boxes that Harmen Liemburg had decorated with designs based on the favorite things of local residents. Everything was color-coordinated. Some neighbors had even created small gardens around the boxes in front of their doors, complete with matching flowers. Upon returning, we were served Equinox soup made of pumpkin and ginger, with roasted sage croutons. At the table, Sunflower Soup led a workshop where participants could draw on edible paper. Cats were drawn - filled with worry and tension. When everyone was finished, the drawings - and with them the worries - were eaten.

By midday on the second day of the Gather Together, it was already bustling at Plaatsmaken. Periphery Center led a workshop involving reading, listening, writing, and ultimately creating a large collaborative work. Participants sat in a circle and discussed how to transform their anger and political disappointment into something constructive. Together, they created a large blueprint, now on display as inspiration in the Compost Heap in the corner of the space.

Outside, the Hospitality Club filled the billboard with brightly colored monoprints. Here and there, a windmill appeared - an early hint at the upcoming Windmill Project, in which they’ll create sails for the blades. After these activities, we enjoyed delicious banana bread in preparation for the basement rave.

It was time for the presentation of Ploegendienst 3. The work of Margreet Sweerts was presented through a performance. Two flag bearers approached the audience from the entrance, waving wildly and then calmly locking eyes. The banners flapped vigorously in the wind. Later, they were tied together into one large flag—surrender and acceptance.

Emmeline de Mooij took us on a hilarious journey through her bodily transformation - from standing still in her body to exuberantly celebrating and sharing it. Moni Zwitserloot performed equally physical texts, with subjects such as worms, maggots, and loose cuticles. Hussel Zhu stood on the millstone and spoke in Chinese about his work. The fact that no one understood what he was saying was no issue - we followed blindly, guided by his passionate explanation.

We headed to the basement for the launch of the collaboratively made music video. For the occasion, the entire basement had been wrapped in black plastic, with a smoke machine, laser lights, and a DJ. We saw Margreet, Emmeline, Hussel, and Moni scream, dance, move, and summon and battle their demons. Then it was our turn to face our own, to dance, arms in the air, helped along by the music and the occasional fitting cocktail, like a Dark & Stormy.

The Autumn Gather Together is part of H0ha, a program in which poets, visual artists, activists, and publishers are invited to (co-)work in rotating “Shifts” (Ploegendiensten) at Plaatsmaken. Each season includes a Gathering Together, in which activities are bundled into a vibrant mix of artistic and social experiment. For this program we collaborate with artist collective Sunflower Soup and curator Lenn Cox.

ABOUT THE PARTICIPANTS

Looking back | Autumn Gather Together

Immerse Yourself in the History of Sonsbeek! On Saturday, November 29, Sonsbeek is organizing a workshop at Plaatsmaken. To celebrate Sonsbeek’s 75th anniversary, we’ll be creating a collection of miniatures of artworks that were shown during the twelve editions of Sonsbeek - or can still be seen in Arnhem today. With your help, we’ll retell the stories of the Sonsbeek collection.

This workshop focuses on the 1958 and 2016 editions. Sonsbeek 1958 marked the last edition that centered around classical European sculpture. It’s hard to imagine now, but no fewer than 337 sculptures were on display. There was also a strong presence of Italian sculptors.
During Sonsbeek 2016, artists from all over the world came to Arnhem. The curators - the Indonesian collective ruangrupa - also found it important that local artists and audiences could participate in the exhibition. A year before the show, ruangrupa opened the ruruhuis to get to know people in Arnhem. During the exhibition, anyone could sign up to use the artworks in the park - for example, for a music performance, a children’s party, or even a wedding.

The Sonsbeek team will share more about this rich history, while everyone gets the chance to recreate an artwork from one of these editions, guided by artists Liam Siepel and Ajna Lorincz. Each miniature will become part of the Sonsbeek collection. As a participant, you’ll become part of Sonsbeek’s rich future history. The miniature collection will gradually expand and be displayed at different times.

In addition to making miniatures, you can also create your own screen print. You’ll work with shapes from the Sonsbeek visual identity and design your own composition. In the end, you’ll go home with your own handmade Sonsbeek screen print - on a shirt, bag, or other canvas. Participants will also receive a free Sonsbeek collection booklet.

Note: please bring your own shirt, bag, or other canvas for screen printing.

When | Saturday, November 29
Time | 13:00 – 16:00
Where | Plaatsmaken
Admission | Free, open entry

Sonsbeek workshop

The Winter Gather Together kicks off on Tuesday, December 9. In the evening there will be a teach-in by Rizqita Naherta & Dewi Sofia.

With this teach-in, Rizqita Naherta’s installation: ‘Merawat Api dari Penyihir-Penyihir Militan Kami - Nurturing the Fire of Our Militant Witches’ will be activated.

On Api Kartini and Combating the Revolutionary Void in Post-Reformation Indonesian Women’s Movement
As an activation of the repurposed archival pages from Api Kartini and the installation itself, the teach-in will look into the socio-political history of the Indonesian militant women’s organization Gerwani and their role of women’s emancipation during feudal, Dutch colonial, and Japanese imperial times in Indonesia.

The CIA-backed destruction and genocide of leftist movements during Suharto’s regime had forced Gerwani to dispersed themselves, and in doing so, womanhood was domesticated by the state through state-funded programs that enforced the ideals of a nuclear family (coined by scholars as state “ibuism”). This left a void after reformation, as amnesia lingers in the Indonesian women’s movement where tricontinental solidarity was once loudly advocated by their militant elders.

What does it mean to have a revolutionary void in the women’s movement of contemporary Indonesia? In what ways has it been filled? What are the responsibilities of diaspores in the Netherlands in maintaining the knowledge of exiled elders? How does this fragment of history influence tricontinental solidarity?

Rizqita Naherta a cultural worker, organiser, and archivist-researcher working collaboratively to nurture archival knowledge of Indonesian queer-marginalized communities and women’s resistance movements that are prone to be forgotten, misapprehended, and lost. Their practice manifests in the assemblage of various living archives built from old scattered media and the stories told in the everyday. Giving homage to their elders that came before them, and recirculating their spirit in the contemporary to counter historical amnesia.

Dewi Sofia (She/Her) is a cultural worker. She holds an MA in Arts and Culture at Leiden University and primarily works as an exhibitions and research assistant at Framer Framed. 

Her interests are mostly found in the intersections of contemporary culture and politics, working within themes of gender, queerness, and anti-imperialist resistance. As a cultural worker, her experience is in curating, writing, and research, integrating collective processes and social-justice driven perspectives in her practice. She is also involved in community-based projects which seek to (re)connect members of the diaspora to the history and political realities of Indonesia and the Philippines. Her projects are often centred on the imaginative possibility of reclaiming space and forming South-South solidarities to shake the matrices of coloniality.

You can reserve a spot via the sign up button on this page.

When | Tuesday, December 9th 19:00 - 21:00h
Location | Plaatsmaken
Access | Free

Teach-in: 'Nurturing the fire of our militant witches'

During the Winter Gather Together on December 13, artistic researcher and maker Katinka de Jonge will be present with the performative installation Talking Backwards, in which everyone is invited to slow down and think out loud. 

Talking Backwards
a flip chart for slow thinking