links to Myvillages' websites and infrastructures

new

Rural School of Economics, 2020 – ongoing – ruralschoolofeconomics.info
Collaborative Village Play, 2021 – ongoing - villageplay.net

from 2003 and ongoing

Company Drinks, 2014 – ongoing - companydrinks.info
International Village Shop, 2006 – ongoing – internationalvillageshop.net
Draw a Farm, 2005 – ongoing - wapke.nl/collections/detail.php?id=29
I like being a farmer and I would like to stay one, 2000 – ongoing - ichbingernebauer.eu

International Village Show, 2014-2016 - internationalvillageshow.myvillages.org
Farmers & Ranchers, 2013-2015 – farmersandranchers.nl
Vorratskammer/Pantry, 2010-2011 - vorratskammer.myvillages.org
Rhyzom/Eco Nomadic School, 2010-2017 - rhyzom.eu/contributors/aaa
Moving Landscape, 2009-2012 – movinglandscape.be
Former Farmland, 2007-2009 – formerfarmland.org
Bibliobox, 2005 – 2016 – bibiobox.org
Myvillages 2003 – 2005 – myvillages.org/oldsite

links to learn more about the three myvillages.org founders

Kathrin Böhm - andmillionsandmillions.net
Wapke Feenstra - wapke.nl
Antje Schiffers - antjeschiffers.de

aaa
aaa (atelier d'architecture autogeree) is a Paris based collective which functions as a collaborative network with variable geometry, which organizes itself according to different topics, contexts of intervention, competencies and availability of participants.

 
 
Ars Electronica Festival
Ars Electronica Festival is one of the most influential media festivals in art and takes place every late summer in Linz, Austria. It is a part of Ars Electronica, that also runs a media lab, museum and price. In 2008 the festival commissioned Wapke Feenstra to make a local version of Former Farmland. Dominique Hoelzl and Martin Honzik were the producers of the Linz edition. And in the Ars Foyer - the lecture and screening program of the Festival - a one-hour-shop of the International Village Shop with screenings of the Village Produce Films took place.

 
 
Bildmuseet Umeå
Bildmuseet is a centre for contemporary art and visual culture as well as a place for experiences, reflection and discussion. We know Bildmuseet over their curator Cecilia Andersson - but even when it is far North it is also recognized with a Special Commendation from the European Museum of the Year Jury in 2014. Since 2012 Bildmuseet has been housed in an acclaimed building by the shores of the Ume River, right next to Umeå Academy of Fine Arts, Umeå Institute of Design and Umeå School of Architecture. The new museum building, designed by Henning Larsen Architects in collaboration with White, has been named one of the world's most beautiful university museums.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Campo Adentro
"INLAND- CAMPO ADENTRO" is a project that examines the role of territories, geopolitics, culture and identity in the relationship between the city and the countryside in Spain today. Its objective is to launch a cultural strategy in support of rural life over a period of three years (2010-2013), specifically made up of an international conference, artistic production through a residency program, an exhibition and a publication.
The project provides artists, farmers, intellectuals, rural development agents, policymakers, curators and art critics, amongst others from the rural and urban spheres, with an open platform for presenting their research and practice. The content is gathered here before it is conveyed to the rest of society.
 
 
Clare Cumberligde & Co
Clare Cumberlidge established Clare Cumberlidge & Co in 2010, building on 20 years experience in the cultural sector.

As co-founder of General Public Agency (2003 – 2010) she developed an influential programme of research and practice within the public realm.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Create London
Create London commission new art throughout east London. Working outside of traditional cultural venues we foster connections between art and people informed by the realities of living in east London. Despite having the highest concentration of artists and creative businesses in the UK, the area has low levels of cultural engagement and remains one of the most deprived parts of the country. Create London’s work aims to bridge the traditional barriers of class, culture and education between artists and people from all social backgrounds.

For more information go to www.createlondon.org or follow @Create_London

 
 
Ditchling Museum
The downland setting and rural way of life inspired artists including Eric Gill, Edward Johnston, David Jones, and Ethel Mairet to settle in Ditchling in the early years of the 20th Century and is reflected in the Museum’s permanent collection and programme.
 
 
Edith Russ Site
The Edith Russ Site for Media Art, is a place solely for media art. The concept is based on the special demands of art realized with new media. This site is not conceived as a museum where art is kept and collected, but rather as a place where media art is presented and discussed. In 2009 artistic director Sabine Himmelsbach worked with Kunstverein Springhornhof on Landscape 2.0 and invited Former Farmland to be part of that. The catalogue Landschaft 2.0/Landscape 2.0 is available at Kehrer Verlag.
 
 
eeaa Design
Angelika Seeschaaf is a London based product designer who originally comes from a village in Hessen, Germany. She started working with Kathrin in 2003 on a project called Park Products, and got involved in the development, design and production of the first series of Höfer Goods in 2006.
 
 
Festival der Regionen
‘Alte Boden, Neue Standbeine’ has been presented during Festival der Regionen 2019. The festival has existed since 1993 and is a two yearly festival of contemporary art and culture taking place in locations outside of the urban centers and cultural hubs in Upper Austria. The Festival aims to establish a dialog between the local populations and local, regional, and international artists. In 2019, the Region of Perg-Strudengau provided the setting for the Festival of the Regions with the topic of Soziale Wärme “Social Warmth”. To counterpoint current sociopolitical issues as the widespread claims of “social coldness”, this year's topic gave stage to togetherness, empathy, and respect. With its 24 municipalities in southeast Mühlviertel, the festival’s region brought together a multitude of different landscapes, living spaces, and farmers’ stories.

 
 
FLACC
As a workplace for visual artists, FLACC creates the conceptual, organisational and technical conditions for realising unique artist projects. Every year, FLACC selects ten artists – from Belgium and abroad, both young and experienced – to set up a new project. FLACC also hosts guest projects.
At regular intervals, FLACC presents the creations realised in the workplace to the public. This is done by means of exhibitions of ongoing or completed projects, public workshops, lectures, and the publication of a yearbook that describes, documents and reflects on all the artist projects of the past year.
 
 
Fries Museum
With around 170,000 objects, it is the largest regional museum in the Netherlands. It brings together art, culture and history under one roof. Highlights of Frisian culture and modern and contemporary Dutch art give this versatile museum its own distinctive flavour.

 
 
 
 
General Public Agency
General Public Agency delivers fresh and effective solutions in planning, regeneration and culture.
 
 
Grizedale Arts
Grizedale Arts is an international research and development agency based in the Lake District National Park. Over the last five years it has acquired a significant reputation for pioneering new approaches to artistic production and exhibition. In contrast to traditional institutions and, indeed, its own history in the UK land art movement, Grizedale Arts has neither studios nor exhibition space, but rather provides artists with the opportunity to realise projects using the social, cultural and economic networks of the area and beyond.
Grizedale Arts runs a programme of events, projects, residencies and activity which seeks to develop the contemporary arts in new directions, away from the romantic and modern assumptions of culture, and to make artists more useful in this complex and multiple-cultural environment.
 
 
 
 
Istanbul Biennale
Myvillages worked from 2018 with till 2019 with IKVS and was presenting land-based art at their IKVS-Salon 2018 within the research-week around The Rural. In 2019 the Potato Growers project was set up and as a part of the openings events of Istanbul Biennal 2019 celebrating The Rural programme and the farmers. The Rural was led by Bige Örer in cooperation with Cappadocia Festival and Fulya Erde. All was organised by the Istanbul Biennial.
 
 
Jap Sam Books
Jap Sam Books is an independent Dutch publishing house specializing in architecture, art, philosophy, design and theory. Jap Sam Books has been established to reflect, connect and respond to developments in these fields, by bringing out a range of critical and reflective books for an international audience. Eleonoor Jap Sam is the director of the publishing house and will publish a serie of books with myvillages.org in coming years.

 
 
KCO Kunst en Cultuur Overijssel
The Art council of the province of Overijssel (NL) works on a broad scale of art and culture activities. Their headquarter is in Zwolle and they work in an area that consist of small towns and cities, and a lot of villages surrounded by a very diverse landscape. Myvillages has a regular contact to the department of Art, Culture and Public Space. Let Geerling is the contact person for most of our cooperation’s.
 
 
Kultivator
KULTIVATOR is an experimental cooperation of organic farming and visual art practice. The group is situated in the rural village Dyestad, on the island Öland on the southeast coast of Sweden. Near to the active agriculture community Kultivator provide a meeting and working space that points out the parallels between provision production and art practice, between concrete and abstract processes for survival. Kultivator runs a permanet shop on their premises.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Kunsthuis Syb
The Triennale of Beetsterzwaag is organized by Kunsthuis SYB, an art house and residency project in Opsterland in Friesland, The Netherlands. The four day event presents to a bigger public the work that is done at SYB. In 2018 the 29 selected artists, both 23 alumni of Kunsthuis SYB as 6 new committees, concentrated on the ancient concept of “almende”. This term, dating back to the Middle Ages, is introduced to further develop the idea of the commons (community / community spirit) that indicates a common share of the community in unbuilt, undivided meadows, forests and fishing waters. Guest curators Julia Geerlings and Niekolaas Johannes Lekkerkerk wanted to revise and renew to go beyond an anthropocentric people-only community and animate it as a more inclusive zone and gathering place of people and nonhumans, the living and the inanimate, the organic and the inorganic.
 
 
 
 
Kunstverein Langenhagen - Langenhagen Art Association
The Kunstverein Langenhagen is a contemporary art space in the small town of Langenhagen close to Hannover in Northern Germany. The Art Association is a partner for the I like being a farmer and I would like to stay one project.
 
 
Kunstverein Pforzheim
Based in the Reuchlinhaus in Pforzheim. We work with this "Kunstverein" over curator Robert Eikmeyer.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
M12 Studio Byers CO USA
The artist Richard Saxton we know for more than a decade and he is our inlet to the plains, and with Kirsten Stolz a director of M12. He introduced Wapke to Kirsten in 2012. She is curator of the Action on the Plains program that M12 runs. M12 is an interdisciplinary group based in Colorado that creates context-based art works, research projects, and education programs. Working in the fields of art and design, we favor projects that are centered in rural areas and which can be developed through dialogical and collaborative approaches.
 
 
mediamaker
mediamaker is a consortium of arts organisations across Shropshire, UK, who are working to present high quality new media arts, to encourage local artists and to develop new audiences. The mediamaker partners believe that history, heritage and modern life can be enhanced and illuminated by new media artwork.
 
 
MITpress DoCA series
Myvillages was invited to edit The Rural in the acclaimed series of anthologies dedicated to major themes and ideas in contemporary art, edited by a scholar, artist, critic or curator. Co-published by Whitechapel Gallery and The MIT Press.
 
 
 
 
Museum in Bewegung
Within a period of six years – 2008 to 2014 – fourteen artists will return to the same places in fourteen villages in Prättigau, a valley in Graubünden, Switzerland, to create projects in collaboration with local residents and councils. Individual rooms entrusted to artists over several years are being used as networked spaces for ongoing exploration and experimentation in which audiences are incorporated. The Museum in Bewegung is an initiative of Peter Trachsel and diehasena.


 
 
 
 
Museum of Contemporary Art (GfZK) Leipzig, Germany
As one of few international institutions the GfZK is dedicated to showcasing work by artists who also work in non-central cultural area's. The GfZK recognizes the importance of including and representing these often non studio based art into its public programme and display. We work from 2014 with Julia Schäfer(curator) and Franciska Zólyom (curator and director) on the International Village Show. And Antje Schiffers has worked a decade ago working with the former director Barbara Steiner, so we have long-term relations here.

 
 
 
 
Overtures
Artcircolo director Serafine Lindemann initiated Overtures in 2002 with Bernd Wiemann of Vodafone R&D, Germany. And in the context of the Overtures program they commissioned Former Farmland during EXPO 08 in Saragossa, Spain.
 
 
Parco Arte Vivente (PAV)
PAV is an experimental center of contemporary art in Turin city conceived by the artist Piero Gilardi. Since 2008, this center located in a former industrial area, has been transformed into an outdoor exhibition site, interactive museum, meeting place and research center. Involving and including a high variety of participants and public, PAV focuses on a dialogue between art and nature, biotechnology and ecology.
Myvillages worked with PAV on the "Grow it Yourself" show and a garden school that is set up in line with the activities of the International Village Shop, with the Libera Scuola del Giardino we aimed to create a platform for exchange that relate to the garden of PAV.
 
 
Peasant Museum Frensdorf
The Bauernmuseum Bamberger Land in Frensorf (Peasant Museum Frensdorf) is situated at a former small holding in the centre of the village. The house and part of the barns are preserved and open to the public, the large barn hosts special exhibitions, a kitchen garden and training kitchen facilitate hands-on workshops.
 
 
 
 
 
 
public works
public works is a London based artist/architects collective which has been working in different constellations of partners and collaborators since 1999.
Current members are artist Kathrin Böhm and Polly Brannan, and architects Andreas Lang and Torange Khonsari.
public works projects address the users of the public spaces, they develop physical and non-physical forms that allow for a participatory and cross hierarchical understanding and transformation of the spaces they work within.

 
 
RHYZOM
An EU funded collective research and network project on local cultural production and trans-local dissemination, initiated by atelier d'architecture autogeree, and with public works (London), The Agency (Sheffield), Platform Garanti (Istanbul), PS2 (Belfast), PEPRAV and myvillages.org as partners.
 
 
School of Art and Design (SAD), University of Wolverhampton
The School of Art and Design has a strong research community and is locally and regionally involved in different programmes.
 
 
 
 
Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery
Operated by Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council, Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery hosts a range of exhibitions, both permanent displays and special events. Mary White is the current director and Adrian Plant is the curator for contemporary projects and commissions.


 
 
SKOR
This Amsterdam based Foundation for Art and Public Space is a nationally operating organisation, which develops art projects in relation to public spaces. SKOR advises and guides organisations that wish to realize art in a public location, and provides financial support where necessary. SKOR helped myvillages to get Dutch content into the Bibliobox.
 
 
Somewhere
Somewhere is a multi-disciplinary creative company run by artists Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie. They produce ambitious, innovative and challenging projects which directly engage with new audiences; spanning film, the web, installation, live events and broadcast media.



 
 
 
 
Springhornhof
The Springhornhof Kunstverein and Foundation, based in Neuenkirchen in the Lüneburg Heath, supports and promotes the notion of artistic engagement with nature, the countryside and village life through a wide-ranging programme of exhibitions, projects and events. They consider themselves playing a key role in ensuring that impulses for the development of contemporary culture can emerge in places other than the major cities.
 
 
Städtische Galerie Nordhorn
The Städtische Galerie Nordhorn with Veronika Olbrich is our partner in the project I like being a farmer and I would like to stay one and the conference Visualizing Agriculture / Images of Farming
 
 
Susanne Cockrell and Ted Purves
Susanne Cockrell and Ted Purves create social art projects that investigate the overlay of urban and rural systems upon the lives of specific communities. They ask questions about the nature of people and place as seen through social economy, history and local ecology.
 
 
TENT Rotterdam
The Rotterdam based art-centre in Witte de Withstraat 50 - In 2011 Myvillages did a presentation on Vorratskammer with Marriëtte Dölle and in 2018 till 2020 the project Boerenzij - The Rural Side was realised with Anke Bangma.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Über Tage
ÜBER TAGE is a series of art projects for the Lusatian Lake District in the east south east of Germany that made it's debut in 2007, continued in 2008 and will continue in 2009 and 2010. Its aim is the careful integration of contemporary art into the Lusatian Lake District. Landscape is understood here as resulting from the interplay of the natural, cultural and social spheres.
 
 
 
 
Vienna Secession
The Austrian Association of Visual Artists
 
 
Whitechapel Gallery - The Rural
The Gallery is a touchstone for contemporary art internationally, plays a central role in London’s cultural landscape and is pivotal to the continued growth of the world’s most vibrant contemporary art quarter. In 2018 Whitechapel Gallery initiated a special series of events and conference dedicated to exploring how artists engage with the contemporary rural sphere.
Partners of Whitechapel in this research are:
Myvillages / Wysing Arts Centre / Department of Geography, The University of Aberystwyth / Istanbul Biennial / Manchester School of Art, Manchester Metropolitan University
Events and fieldtrips were resulting in The Rural Assembly: Contemporary Art and Spaces of Connection - 20 – 22 June 2019
The Rural Assembly draws on a series of public programmes and research that developed throughout 2018. It looks at contemporary artists and creative practitioners who are challenging the assumptions made about rural life and culture, providing a new vision of the countryside grounded in everyday experience and a critique of the rural-urban binary. Connecting the local to the global, this conference invites an international and transdisciplinary conversation on art and the rural, with a focus on profiling projects from across the world.
 
 
This website documents the work of Myvillages from 2003 to 2023.

To find out where Myvillages is working at the moment visit ruralschoolofeconomics.info and villageplay.net.
All our project websites are listed at “about us”.

Contact us at info@myvillages.org