It’s not just Strandeiland

It’s not just Strandeiland responds to the ongoing construction of Strandeiland, an artificial island in Amsterdam. The project is offering a careful de-construction of the dominant narratives of growth and development which are justifying/normalizing the violence that underlays land reclamation. Who has the right to inhabit the seabed? What other relationships could be practiced with places beyond extraction and appropriation? How to serve a place to counter the violence of the ongoing colonial inhabitation of land and sea? The audiovisual installation invites the island into the space and unfolds a process of feeling the many injustices that Strandeiland represents. Excerpt: Strandeiland is a product of an imperial imagination. A dream to extend the territories. An investment into the countries capital, and power through real estate. A result of dominance exerted and rooted in dominant Western culture, ruling over other beings that are considered a resource to be extracted. ‘Nature’ Strandeiland came alive through a planned and forced displacement of sand, sediment and water with all their inhabitant communities. An invisible process of dredging on the bottom of the sea. Leaving behind a hole in the seabed. Sand is spit out on the place of the planned island until the sand arises on the surface of the water. I need to listen to the place to stop other voices in my head. I need to listen to the place to make sense of my planetary existence. I need to listen to the place to be able to collaborate with the place, to give up control. I need to listen to the place to be able to begin healing, together with the place. It’s not just, ‘a new neighborhood’ It’s not just, ‘new land’ It’s not just, ‘a game playing with water and sand’ It’s not just Sand. It’s not just Strandeiland.