Dear Network,In this special newsletter, we regret to inform you that after ten wonderful years, ARIAS will officially come to an end on 1 March, 2027.
The facts
Over the past decade, ARIAS has grown into an established platform and network of artists-researchers in Amsterdam and beyond. In early June, the current ARIAS board decided to end its collaboration and withdraw funding from the joint project.
(Read the statements from the Board and the Advisory Board below.)
The feelings (and the political)
Creating peer-to-peer learning gatherings where artists-researchers exchange diverse perspectives through workshops, reading sessions, studio mixers, and other modes of sharing research practice in development, is at the heart of what we do. That’s probably why the reality of ARIAS’ ending only hit us during recent September events. While enjoying the nourishing depth and joy emerging from these gatherings, it dawned on us that these were among the last we would be able to host.
During each of these events, we looked around a room full of artists, activists and researchers who engaged in generous conversation about the challenges, aesthetics, and intimacies of ways of being and working together across differences. We gathered around complex issues, including disability access in the Care Ecologies reading group, archival consciousness in a Slow AI workshop, and reconsidering ideas on property and housing in the weaving stories series.
In the rounds of closing remarks, the importance of these kinds of exchanges was underlined. Participants mentioned the value and uniqueness of bringing a mix of discursive, personal, artistic and activist approaches to the table, as well as the extent to which we need that plurality of knowledges to become ‘uncomfortable’ and change our ways.
These conversations and explorations that are far from complete.
The process
The decision to defund ARIAS follows a period during which it was known that the partners intended to withdraw their contributions due to budget cuts. We wrote to you in earlier newsletters that the board had tasked our team with exploring an alternative organisational and financial model. The plan we developed offered that alternative, and was informed by exchanges with other artistic research initiatives in the Netherlands, as well as input from the network, and advice from experts in our field.
Although the board responded positively to the plan, calling it inspiring, they decided not to invest further in ARIAS. As they bring ten years of shared work and accumulated knowledge to a close, they are keeping open the possibility of exploring parts of the plan to create a new cross-institutional collaboration in a financially brighter future.
The situation reminds us of the destroyed landscapes Anna Tsing describes in her book The Mushroom at the End of the World. Revival and regeneration come from within. It’s the mycelium that finds life amid the ruins, supporting a surviving ecology, with mushrooms fruiting, and so on… That's our hope, that the absence ARIAS leaves is one that will be filled by another initiative that, this time around, comes from the ground, from within the practices of research, from you, the network itself.
The wrapping
In the coming months, we will focus on questions of knowledge transfer, archiving, and closing. We are still working out the details with the support from our advisory board (Katja Kwastek, Sabine Niederer, Colin Sterling, Paula Albuquerque).
We would also like to involve you, our network, in exploring how we can keep the knowledge and resources (website, archive materials) available to you as a commons, and what forms that might take. If you have ideas on this or would like to help care for part of ARIAS’ legacy, get in touch through this form.
There are a few final events left on our programme, so please keep an eye on the agenda and newsletters for updates. We will also keep you posted on which of ARIAS’ activities may continue elsewhere—for example, what will happen to the thematic lines and how you can stay connected.
Save the date for our closing party on Thursday, 11 February, from 16:00 to 18:30! It will feature an ARIAS bingo and a “garage sale,” where you can win great prizes, including limited edition pieces of ARIAS merch. Let us know here if you can make it.
The ARIAS team
Nienke Scholts, Patricia de Vries, Sofía Fernández Blanco
Statement from the Board
After over ten years of bringing together artistic research across Amsterdam's universities and universities of applied sciences, the ARIAS Board has made the difficult decision that ARIAS will not continue in its current organisational and financial form after February 2027. This decision reflects the increasing financial pressures across education and research, affecting all partner institutions, which have made it necessary to reassess priorities and expenditure, including the resources available for collaborative initiatives such as ARIAS. As a result, the current organisational and financial structure of ARIAS can no longer be sustained.
Over the past decade, ARIAS has created an important space for exchange, experimentation and collaboration across disciplines and institutions. We are grateful to the many researchers, artists, designers, interns, advisory council members, past and present ARIAS team members, board members and institutional partners who have contributed to building and sustaining this network.
We would like to express our particular gratitude to Nienke Scholts, Patricia de Vries and Sofia Fernandez Blanco, who have formed the core ARIAS team over the past two years, for the care, energy and commitment with which they have supported ARIAS through a challenging and uncertain period.
In the coming months, the focus will be on bringing the current activities to a careful conclusion, with particular attention to documenting and archiving the research, activities and collaborations developed through ARIAS over the past decade. We want to ensure that this rich body of work, together with the knowledge, experiences and relationships it represents, remains accessible and can continue to inform and inspire future artistic research and collaborations.
While ARIAS in its current form will come to an end, this does not diminish the importance of collaboration in artistic research. The possibility of new forms of cooperation will be explored by interested institutions, but no decisions about a future structure have yet been made. We will keep the ARIAS community informed of future developments.
The relationships and practices that have emerged through ARIAS extend beyond its organisational structure. We hope that they will continue to grow and find new forms through the people who have shaped this community, and we remain committed to finding sustainable ways to support the conditions in which artistic research can flourish across institutional and disciplinary boundaries.
The ARIAS Board
Julia Noordegraaf, Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen, Universiteit van Amsterdam
Caroline Visser, Voorzitter College van Bestuur, AHK
Ruby Hoette, Director Sandberg and Research (Rietveld Sandberg Research), GRA
Freek Schmidt, Faculteit der Sociale en Geesteswetenschappen, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Andre Neumann, hoofd kenniscentrum Digitale Media en Creative Industie, HvA
Statement from the Advisory Board
The advisory board is very concerned about the decision to defund ARIAS. Currently, we see the value of artistic research to be acknowledged more broadly, resulting in programmes and collaborative projects that receive funding and recognition. With these developments, it's hard to understand the withdrawal of support for a network that, for ten years, built and brought together a diverse group of academic and artistic researchers in fruitful interdisciplinary research groups and well-attended, practice-oriented programmes. Shutting down the platform completely would waste resources and knowledge, as it would disconnect the larger network from the digital and physical knowledge exchange ARIAS offers through its inspiring events, nourishing newsletters, and informative website. We strongly advise the decision-making bodies to look for ways to ensure the continuation of ARIAS’ valuable resources and activities. Meanwhile, the advisory board will support the team in finding ways to embed elements of ARIAS in other contexts and ensure the network and knowledge can be transferred and preserved.
The ARIAS Advisory Board
Katja Kwastek
Sabine Niederer
Colin Sterling
Paula Albuquerque