Using Tool Sheds as a point of departure, this year Nieuwe Instituut’s Call for Fellows invites applicants to conceptualise, design and test applied research tools, instruments, methods, formats and processes for generative world-building using material, theoretical, political, time-based or place-based sets of practices.
By calling for different forms of research, they invite applicants to embrace embodied forms of knowing, learning and investigating, and to think more deeply about the relationship between theory and practice. Nieuwe Instituut and its Research collective are currently engaged in imagining how museums and cultural institutions could function as ‘testing grounds’: equitable sites for action-based forms of research with the aim of enacting a society that supports all life, while at the same time investigating how to approach and situate ‘research as testing’ within the role of a cultural institution.
The Tool Shed is one of the Research team’s concepts for public interfacing, through which research can engage and interact with various publics. Nieuwe Instituut offer their own tools, while also leaving the metaphorical doors of the Tool Shed open for others to contribute and share their own.
Applicants are encouraged to submit a proposal that addresses their current investigations, explorations, or unfinished thoughts through the lens of architecture, design and digital culture. Proposals should clearly state their focus and aims, and also the socio-economic, nature-cultural and political context in which they are based. They may incorporate a larger system of reference, schools of critical thought and transdisciplinary practices, and non-academic references, as well as different forms of engagement and co-creation.
Nieuwe Instituut offers two Research Fellowship positions for six months (from January 2024 to June 2024). Each of these positions includes a maximum budget of 20,000 euros. Stipends may be subject to a withholding tax.
There is no age limit for applicants. Individuals and collectives from all places of residence are invited to apply.
