Summary
Waste is one of the most visible challenges in cities like Rotterdam; yet it is often addressed through technical fixes or behavioural campaigns that overlook everyday realities and experiences. In this transdisciplinary research project, we approach waste differently: in the neighbourhood of Oud-Charlois (in Rotterdam), we approach waste as a reflection of values, habits, and relationships to public space. By exploring the frictions between policy and lived experience, and between different values and ways of looking, the project treats these frictions as starting points for imagination and learning. Drawing inspiration from the Surrealist exquisite corpse artistic method, the aim is to assemble different types of knowledge and experiences into creative ideas for tackling waste and fostering circular practices. Through a one-year exploratory process, the project partners (civil servants, researchers, designers, artists), will map and situate waste-related frictions in public space, use design and artistic approaches to translate them into materials for civic engagement and collective creativity, and reflect on how they connect back to policy and institutional learning. Activities include guided “trash walks”, co-mapping sessions, and the co-creation of a public installation that brings frictions into public space.
Partners
Funding organisation: NWO – KIEM MV: https://www.nwo.nl/en/projects/lgxwg94363
Consortium: Municipality of Rotterdam; Future Compass (https://www.futurescompass.com/about/); Noigo
Artistic collaborator: Parel Strik (https://www.parelstrik.com/about)
Project duration: 1 March 2026 – 28 February 2027
Who is working on this project
Completed projects
This project builds on the NWO-XS project Seeds for transitions: Realising sustainable urban futures from the bottom up led by Corelia Baibarac-Duignan in collaboration with Julieta Matos Castaño and Creative Coding Utrecht (2023 – 2024).
(Credits to Emma Nap for the drawing.)