< Program overview

Interactions
Interactions is a talent development trajectory of POST, in which the exchange of perspectives, working methods and knowledge is central. Creatives and thinkers from different disciplines work together on a self-designed final presentation around a central theme. The focus of the program is to stimulate the individual practice of each participant within a collective framework. POST offers space, time and resources in this process, and supports the participants on a practical, theoretical and financial level.

Compost
During the 2021 trajectory, the group started from the idea of compost. Compost is continuously in a state of transformation, and is a dynamic living process. It is a microsystem in itself, which nourishes the larger macrosystem. Humans have an undeniable role in this interaction. What we add to our compost eventually returns to the earth. This way, the place where we are can remain alive. Poet and writer Toko-Pa aptly expresses this thought: "If we are made of the same stuff as our place, then we are expressions of that place, but the reverse is also true. What we bring, or don't bring, to the tending of a place is also part of how that place is shaped.” [1]

Connections
Within compost, there are infinite relations: between past, present and future, between micro and macro, human and earth, life and death. It is a constant process of becoming and ‘un-becoming’. These connections can be found metaphorically in the Interactions participants. Each work is a glimpse into their personal inner space. At the same time, each work, each individual, each story, nurtures the greater whole of the collective. With Compost: (Un)becoming they hope to nourish the inner world of the visitor too.

Storytelling
This way the group resonates with Donna Haraway’s thought that the world can only continue to exist by telling unique and extraordinary stories. [2] As she beautifully puts it in 'The Camille Stories - Children of Compost': "compostists soon found that storytelling was the most powerful practice for comforting, inspiring, remembering, warning, nurturing compassion, mourning, and becoming-with each other in their differences, hopes, and terrors." [3] And it is precisely this that Mario Sergio Alvarez, Sabina Mikelic, Marjoke van de Plassche, Hans-Hannah, Lotte de Schouwer and Sophie Thedinga experienced during their Interactions trajectory, and what they envisage with Compost: (Un)becoming. 

Sources:
[1] Toko-Pa (2019) ‘Belonging to Your Place’
[2] Terranova, F. (2016) Donna Haraway: Story Telling for Earthly Survival 
[3] Haraway, D. (2016) ‘The Camille Stories - Children of Compost’, in Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene, p. 150.