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) will take 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 - 7 September 2025
About the ploegendienst
Collective Periphery Center researches the formation of collectives during their residency (Shift). How can the collective be a space for ideas, desires and gatherings within the current social and political landscape? The central question is what conditions make collectives possible and how, like the body, this is changeable: it can transform, grow older and develop different needs.
Periphery Center invites collective Girls Like Us to join them from their years of experience to deepen this process around the theme of Inheritance 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.
With the theme of (Queer) Inheritance topics such as embodied knowledge and legacy are explored. Thereby, viewing the body as an archive where memories and (intergenerational) stories nest - intentionally or unconsciously. During the residency (Shift), Periphery Center examines how experiences leave traces in the body: physically, mentally and through movement and transformation. What has been passed on to us, and what do we wish to leave behind to next generations?
The collective process involves reading and listening together, cooking and sharing meals, and writing through collective prompts and individual reflections. All these moments will be woven together and published into a continuous string of thoughts. Alongside working with traditional publishing methods such as print, the project also experiments with ways of landing words and thoughts in the physical space at Plaatsmaken. What does the space our collective body longs for look like, and how do we make it a reality?
The residency with Periphery Center and Girls Like Us is part of the program Time Out / Tune In, curated by program maker Lenn Cox around the shared household of Plaatsmaken. Time Out / Tune In connects the cyclical nature of time, with a call to slow down! The value of time and slowing down for artists and collectives is fundamental and constantly under threat due to the productivity that is needed to survive in the precarious cultural field.
This program explores how to organise together, what we can learn from each other and what is at stake in the cultural field and beyond. Time Out / Tune In dances through chosen families, kindred spirits and ancestral matters. Read more about the program Time Out / Tune In.
We hope to see you at the opening on June 21 and/or during the various Summer Gather Together activities!
About the participants
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.