A performative walk with Ienke Kastelein
What happens when we stop seeing the landscape as a backdrop and begin to experience it as a living performance?
Join interdisciplinary artist Ienke Kastelein for a unique performative walk through the border landscape of Prosperpolder. Together, we will slow down and tune our senses to the subtle rhythms of this extraordinary wetland, where water and land, tides and sky, people and habitats continuously shape one another.
Rather than simply observing the landscape, participants become part of it. Through attentive walking, perception and shared presence, the polder gradually reveals itself as a dynamic stage where bodies, plants, animals and the elements are all performers in an ever-changing ecological choreography.
For Ienke Kastelein, walking is at once research, performance and scenography. Treating public space as both studio and stage, she invites participants to experience Prosperpolder in unexpected ways, discovering new relationships between themselves and the living environment.
No artistic experience is required—only curiosity, comfortable walking shoes and a willingness to look, listen and move differently.
The evening programme at De Maalderij can be attended independently or as part of the wider Made of Walking programme:
- 16:30–18:30 – De Maalderij
- Lecture: Border Landscapes in Transition by Pieter-Jan Meire (Belgium), Network Director of the Verdronken Land van Saeftinghe Nature Reserve, exploring the history of the border region and its changing landscapes.
- Guided Tour: Heritage exhibition led by Peter Deckers (Belgium), Chair of De Maalderij.
- 18:30 – Community Meal
Soup and bread shared with participants. - 19:00 – The Mobile Wetland
An immersive audiovisual experience by Fred Adam (France)
Walking Arts & Local Communities (WALC) is an artistic cooperation project, co-funded by the European Union, Creative Europe, starting in January 2024 for four years. With seven partners from five countries, WALC establishes an International Center for Artistic Research and Practice of Walking Arts, in Prespa, Greece, at the border with Albania and North Macedonia, backed up by an online counterpart in the format of a digital platform for walking arts.
WALC builds on the previous work of hundreds of artists and researchers already practicing Walking Arts as a collaborative medium, and having met at the significant previous walking arts events and encounters in Greece, Portugal, Spain, France, Belgium, and during online activities at walk · listen · create.
We acknowledge the support of the EU Creative Europe Cooperation grant program in the framework of the European project WALC (Walking Arts and Local Community).
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.
| Ienke Kastelein |
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