Space in the City
The School presents Space in the City in Gallery 3 of Het Nieuwe Instituut, a story of The School in 12 chapters. Within this exhibition the organization dissects itself in an attempt to entangle the web of artistic perspectives which it has created over the past five years. How do we connect with a space? How do we keep in touch with each other? How do satellite spaces grow individually while still strengthening their network? Space in the City is an exhibition collaboratively and individually built by 20 artists from The School’s current space Maison Florida.
The project of The School came to live in 2017 in an abandoned hotel near the station area of Hasselt. Since then the organization has occupied multiple empty spaces in various cities. Its focus has always changed depending on what space it’s in and what neighborhood it is surrounded by. Yet there is a certain leitmotif in the methodology of The School that is difficult to fully grasp. In 2020 The School was granted 6000 m2 of space by VDAB Limburg for artistic research, experiment and space making. Inside the former industrial learning center Maison Florida was born, a house for the fierce individual and a pitstop for temporary wildness. After three years this chapter is slowly coming to an end. But new projects are already appearing at the horizon.
Within this exhibition the story of The School will be told in 12 chapters. Both past and future perspectives will be written, directed and curated by 20 People of Florida. What have we learned in the last three years? What will our future spaces look like? How can our previous approach serve as a tool for the development of future projects? And what does this new era mean for the DNA and network of The School?
About The School
The School is an organization that researches urban improvement through interdisciplinary and intercultural experimentation and space- making. Since the start in 2017 The School has been organic with its participants and nomadic in its projects and spaces. Trading every time one base camp in the city for its next, and only continuing when new spaces and voices are there to be seen and heard. Milan, Tongeren and Liège have hosted their projects and Hasselt has been the ever returning basis for its urban and didactic research. The School is currently at its next crossroad, ending one space and exploring the next opportunities.