Unpotato – Edible manifesto making workshop

The potato is usually seen as a trivial and ubiquitous source of food; it’s just there. We don’t think too much of it, which is surprising given that there are more than 4500 varieties of potatoes known worldwide and that almost every food culture in the world uses potatoes. This ubiquity obscures how the lives of humans and potatoes have been entangled throughout history. In the kitchen of the panic factory, we’ll follow the potato on its journey through continents, soil, food, metabolism and starch by collectively preparing an edible manifesto. During this workshop we’ll write, draw, and stamp on edible paper made from potato starch. Using pigments from sweet potatoes, juices, and potato stamps, we’ll visualise how to transform populist purée politics into a pluralistic polyphonic potato tornado. Finally, we’ll throw the manifesto and the potato stamps into a soup that will be served at the end of the workshop and eaten by all participants, thus digesting the original zine.

Sunflower Soup was born out of a shared activist engagement and a need to explore what art can mean beyond the confines of the individual. The collective is driven by a number of questions: can a shared way of working contribute to a less detached experience of art? How do people relate to each other and to the more-than-human world? How do we reconcile the importance of activism with a poetic visual language that allows for humour, paradox and ambiguity?

Reserve your spot on the Eventbrite-page of the event.
Participation is free, but donations are very welcome.

The Potato Parliament: A Spud-itorial Debate

Do all potatoes have the same interests or needs? What would potatoes say in a debate? Are all potatoes created equal and privy to the same rights? This workshop explores the existence, language, and connected system of potatoes through playful embodiment and poetic political imagination. 

In the first part of the workshop, participants will be provided with a potato for whom they will form a political party. Each person will receive an information card about their potato and formulate a proposal for a new law through the eyes of their potato. The facilitator, i.e. Head Potato, will help guide each party to come up with a name, slogan, and main debate points. 

In the second half of the workshop, all of the potato parties will come together and debate whether the proposed laws should be passed in Parliament or not. All members will vote on passing or rejecting the bill. 

The debate session will be recorded and presented during the remaining days of the PPP workshop programme.

The Potato Parliament: A Spud-itorial Debate with Jody Aikman
Saturday 31 May, 12:00 – 15:30
Wednesday 18 June, 12:00 – 15:30

Jody Aikman is a poet and performer exploring the intersection where artist, audience and message meet. She researches the silences in language by questing meaning, ambiguity, and implication through her writing. Her performances are created to blur the line between audience and artist, investigating the relationship between herself, the other and the world. 

Reserve your spot on the Eventbrite-page of the event.
Participation is free, but donations are very welcome.

PotatoPress

On 29 May, PotatoPress opens the doors of its editorial room to all curious, wandering, and ambitious potato journalists to contribute to the PPPotato newspaper! Come peel a potato to reveal its hidden layers, dig deep in the earth for its roots, expose its versatility, become the paparazzi of potatoes, bring out the latest (fake) news, or contribute to the entertainment section. 

In the editorial room, we’ll explore the politics of the potato together. Using different perspectives, personal knowledge, field research, and (reliable) sources, we’ll reflect on the role of the potato in our society, the global economy, our common thinking, different ideologies and strong opinions. What does the potato have to tell us? How can the potato nurture our ideas about the politics of being together and interacting with each other? We’ll also dive deep into our primal Dutch frying culture and the snackbar as a meeting place. What is the role of the snackbar in today’s times? 

The newspaper will be published and distributed in the neighbourhood of P139.

Participants can drop in and join any time. You can sign up using the Eventbrite link.

Mul-thee-fuhngk-shuh-nl is a collective that creates dynamic installations with a crossover between workshops, public space installations, and happenings through interactions with others. Their projects share a common focus on engaging with the environment and fostering exchanges with a diverse audience, generating new imaginaries around the contexts the projects take place in.

P(r)otato Propaganda Production workshop

Make Playful P(r)otato Propaganda with Sunflower Soup! During this workshop, participants will engage in experimental ways of imagining politics, while creating new PPP slogans, pamphlets and monumental banners together. Using PPP’s very own Pulp-font stamps, and an amazing collection of fabrics, we will produce PPP propaganda that is poetic, colourful, and polyphonic. Let’s Peel the Power! And practise the politics of poetic potato promotion.

The workshop is open to all ages (grown up and baby potatoes) and no prior skills are required to take part. The banners produced in the first workshop will become part of the PPP and will be displayed in the space. 

P(r)otato Propaganda Production workshop with Sunflower Soup

Sunday May 25, 15:00 – 18:00
Saturday June 14, 14:00 – 17:00

Sunflower Soup was born out of a shared activist engagement and a need to explore what art can mean beyond the confines of the individual. The collective is driven by a number of questions:can a shared way of working contribute to a less detached experience of art? How do people relate to each other and to the more-than-human world? How do we reconcile the importance of activism with a poetic visual language that allows for humour, paradox and ambiguity?

Reserve your spot on the Eventbrite-page of the event.
Participation is free, but donations are very welcome.

Potato Growing Workshop

13:00 hrs at W139 or 14:00 hrs at the 4Siblings field.

Polyculture, in opposition to monoculture, is a system of growing plants that are beneficial to each other and create a regenerative effect on the soil. We think of polyculture as a symbol of political practices of living together in community. In this workshop we will collectively learn about polyculture and the life cycle of plants—from seed to sowing, to growth, and harvest. On 13 May we will sow potatoes and think about other plants and their existence from seed to harvest, throughout the seasons. In order to facilitate this thought process on the lifecycle of plants we will engage in an embodied personification exercise with all the elements that contribute to the life of our small garden. The workshop will be outdoors, so please wear warm clothes, closed shoes and bring a bottle of water. No experience with farming or performance is needed.

Please note: if you join the workshop at 13:00 at W139, you will be participating in an approximately 30 minutes bike procession to the 4Siblings field. Please bring your bike and a bag or carrier to transport material.

A follow up workshop will be dedicated to harvesting the results. 

Date and time are still to be confirmed (depending on when the potatoes are ready to harvest.)

4Siblings is an artist collective and a community garden focusing on creating ecofeminist and queer connections to food and land. They focus on land-based art and research, collectively creating gardens as artistic platforms. These outdoor spaces allow artists and makers to develop their practice from the perspective of community and ecology. 

Reserve your spot on the Eventbrite page of the event.
Participation is free, but donations are very welcome.

Opening PPP

Join us on Friday 23 May from 19:00 for the opening of W139’s new exhibition: PPP!

This spring, the Sunflower Soup collective brings PPP to life—a Political Party for Potatoes and other beings. PPP transforms W139 into a site of collective practice: an open workspace where you are welcome to make and share!

While the potato plays a leading role within the party, the P’s are open to many interpretations: PPP could stand for Protorealist Pan-Political ProjectPractical Party of Provocation, or Pansexual Potato Phantasy. This way the PPP functions as a pluriform platform for overlooked or obscured perspectives and aims to be a refuge for those who challenge the current political status quo.

Through a comprehensive workshop programme PPP will gradually expand further over the course of two months. A multitude of collectives, makers, and visitors will collaboratively explore the politics of the potato and contribute to the PPP. As well as being playful and speculative, PPP will become a real physical place of political imagination and connection, proposing alternatives to the ways contemporary politics are shaped. Find out more about the workshop programme soon on our website!

Sunflower Soup was born out of a shared activist engagement and a need to explore what art can mean beyond the confines of the individual.

PPP is supported by Amsterdam Fund for the Arts, Mondriaan Fund and the Cultural Participation Fund.

Visual identity by June Jungeun Yang.

FLUSH #6: No Pares (Sigue Sigue)

PRODUCE, HAVE FUN, IMPROVE AND SMILE! by Sergi Casero

Like hamsters on a wheel, we run in a race that has no finish line – because every now and then another goal appears on the horizon. This performance is for everyone who feels overwhelmed by too many responsibilities and activities. For those who are learning a new language, playing an instrument, obsessively setting goals and making to-do-lists, or in a constant quest for fulfilment, self-development and being a better version of themselves. Every second counts! In an achievement society doing nothing is a grave sin. But we are more than the sum of our achievements, or are we? How does the productivity obsession shape our desires, our bodies and our limits?

Through the structure of a spinning class, No Pares (Sigue Sigue) confronts the hidden violence within neoliberal ideals of efficiency, self-optimization, and endless improvement.

How did we buy the neoliberal tale that we are the architects of our own fate?
Can we resist? Can we break free from the inertia of productivity and its seductive pull?

Join us for this participatory performance – an opportunity to reflect and endure.

Doors open — 18:30
Performance — 19:30
End — 20:30

The artist is supported by Amsterdam Fund for the Arts

FLUSH is a flourishing collaboration between Espacio Estamos Bien and W139, located in the toilets of W139. FLUSH operates as a flexible form of organizing and creating, enabling various types of collaboration. FLUSH aims to foster inter-local relationships, viewing Amsterdam as a hub for facilitating diverse interactions and building connections that bridge distances. Joyful, friendly and decentralized connections extend beyond the Amsterdam art scene.

Curatorial Text: José Rosales 
Production: Julia Nowicka and Espacio Estamos Bien
Design: Sergi Casero

Rainbow Social Music Club

Join us for a drink to celebrate the end of the exhibition together with the Rainbow Soulclub members in an informal gathering followed by a sonic activation by The Social Music Club from 20:00 hrs onwards.

The Social Music Club is a participatory music session for musicians, non-musicians, amateurs, and professionals alike hosted by Aimée Theriot and Koen Nutters. In these gatherings for musical improvisation without dogmas, the emphasis lies on meeting and getting to know each other, while also discussing, putting into practice and stretching the understanding of what exactly music is and can be. Bring an instrument, an object or your own voice if you want to join.

Rainbow Soulclub is an art and solidarity collective founded in 2005 by visual artists Saskia Janssen and George Korsmit. Composed of makers and thinkers coming from different social, economic, and cultural backgrounds, they meet regularly at the collective studio in the drop-in centre of Stichting De Regenboog Groep, an organisation in Amsterdam dedicated to people experiencing homelessness, addiction, poverty, and the challenges that come with undocumented status.

This event is free, but The Social Music Club has a limited capacity so please register here via Eventbrite.

Meet Rainbow Soulclub #2

Join us on Saturday, April 12, to meet Rainbow Soulclub members during an informal afternoon featuring various activities, including live painting at the drawing table with Ebby, Abdi, and David, spiritual education in the tent with Mimosa, an informal group discussion on homelessness and housing in Amsterdam with Malika Amghar, a vegan spring roll workshop with Ting, and the classic Free Advice sessions with various Rainbow Soulclub members—get answers to all your life questions from an unexpected perspective.

Live music: Jacques (guitar and vocals)
Food: Soup by George & Perry (vegan)
Guided tour of the space – Tomas, George, Saskia

Malika Amghar has been working for more than 20 years in the social domain of Amsterdam on practical and creative solutions regarding homelessness and housing at De Regenboog Groep. Her focus is on what is possible and what does work: “I find coming up with solutions fascinating and challenging; my passion lies in removing a root cause in the system. I don’t like mopping with the tap running.

Picture by Maarten Nauw / Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.

Meet Rainbow Soulclub #1

Join us on Saturday, March 22, for an informal afternoon with the Rainbow Soulclub, where you can meet members and take part in a variety of activities. Enjoy live painting at the drawing table with Ebby, Abdi, and David, explore spiritual education in the tent with Mimosa, and join an open discussion with human rights lawyer Eva Bezem. Take part in a vegan spring roll workshop with Ting and experience the classic Free Advice sessions with Rainbow Soulclub members, where you can get answers to life’s big and small questions from a fresh perspective.

Eva Bezem has been a human rights lawyer for many years, specializing in migration law. She is particularly committed to advocating for the legal status of Surinamese former Dutch nationals. In 2024, Eva submitted a residence permit application for 100 ‘former Dutch Surinamese’ individuals.

Picture by Maarten Nauw / Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.