After an exciting edition in 2025, the Independent School for the City and Loom - practice for cultural transformation, will again organise a compact workshop looking at the public space of the city as a place for protest. Together with René Boer, Mark Minkjan and Katía Truijen, we will regard activism as a discipline that involves revealing facts, building narratives and creating real-world impact. Whether it is the fossil fuel industry or the bankrupt housing system, Rotterdam has plenty of battles to be fought that resonate over the globe. During the workshop days, we will identify urgent issues, create counter positions, and design situated strategies, while proposing alternative solutions.

Drawing inspiration from past and present generations of activists, we will explore how to design the communication of non-conventional narratives and the conditions for disobedient assemblies. This could include blockades, barricades, banners, choreographies, legal tactics, social media memes, squatting operations, consumer strikes or other, more subtle forms of expressing dissent with regard to the status quo—using whatever tools are necessary to drive change.

See the whole programme HERE.