“How do we listen to the more-than-human voice?

What if there is not one voice, but many different ones?

How can we listen to all life in artistic ways?

How can we implement our findings in the way our organisation works?”

Rabiaâ Benlahbib, excerpt from Zoöp inauguration speech.

Last Friday, November 24, Kunstfort was officially inaugurated as a Zoöp! This day now marks the official beginning of our commitment to principles of ecological regeneration in our programming and ways of working.

The inauguration took place at Het Nieuwe Instituut in front of an auditorium hall with partner organisations, colleagues, friends, family, and many others who place ecological concerns central to their hearts and actions. Part of the inauguration ceremony were poetically woven speeches by our brand new Speaker for the Living Bonnie Chopard, and our director Rabiaâ Benlahbib, accompanied by a slideshow showcasing atmospheric images sketching how history, art, and ecology intertwine and grow at the Kunstfort. They then signed the Zoöp contract formally tying Kunstfort as an organisation to ecologically regenerative principles. Kunstfort and the Zoönomic Institute signed the documents with pens but remarkably also with their thumbs covered in soil, a symbolic intertwining of interests of more-than-human life and the Zoönomic framework. On this day, Kunstfort became a Zoöp alongside the sustainable planned workshop De Ceuvel in Amsterdam and the re­gen­er­a­tive foundation Bodemzicht near Ni­jmegen, who also signed their Zoöp contract with pens and soil-covered thumbs.

If you want to get an idea of the ideological pillars that give form to the Zoöp initiative, you can now see the Zoöp manifest on our website by following this link.

For those of you unfamiliar with the concept of Zoöp, it is a term short for Zoöperation: cooperation with zoë, Greek for ‘life’. It is an organisation model for cooperation between human and more-than-human life that safeguards the interests of all life. The model makes the interests of more-than-human life part of organisational decision-making, by installing a so-called Speaker for the Living as an advisor, teacher, and sparring partner in the organisation. The framework was collectively developed at Het Nieuwe Instituut by ecologists, artists, designers, lawyers, entrepreneurs, and philosophers.