We’re kicking off July with an opening on 3 July from 18:00 to 20:00 for two projects: ‘UMWELT Amstel’ by Floris Schönfeld and ‘Telling the Bees’ by Stef Veldhuis, which take place outside the Glazen Huis to explore the intertwining of biological and technological information networks. This summer, we are organising various workshops and talks, and we look forward to welcoming you to the Amstelpark.
[DUO EXHIBITION]
UMWELT Amstel & Telling the Bees Floris Schönfeld & Stef Veldhuis 3 July - 13 September Opening: Friday 3 July • 18:00 - 20:00 Location: Glazen Huis
This summer, Zone2Source is bringing together two striking projects in and around the Glass House in Amstelpark: UMWELT Amstel by Floris Schönfeld and Telling the Bees by Stef Veldhuis. Both exhibitions challenge visitors to rethink the boundaries between natural and technological systems – and to reveal the invisible connections that surround us.
[exhibition image]
In UMWELT Amstel,Floris Schönfeld explores the possible entanglements of various entities within the Amstelpark: from insect hedges and tree roots to underground data cables and servers. The work playfully seeks a way to forge new, unexpected connections and make visible the interwoveness of different systems - the binary computational signals of machines and the pheromone driven communication of ants - with our human existence.
Four site-specific sculptures titled Portals which are placed around the Glass House are connected to the existing work PUK* Processor- housing two colonies of bees from the species Messor Barbarus- and a new work SIM Amstel which are installed inside the pavilion. All works are connected to each other via a mesh of data cables installed above ground in the park and running inside the pavilion. To learn more about these works and the artist himself, click here.
Telling the Bees by Stef Veldhuis shows the tension between two different logics of conservation. Human conservation typically focuses on stasis. With technological interventions, we try to stop time and deny transformation and decay. Bees preserve their wax, honey, and brood through continuous adaptation. A stability that exists only under continuous change.
In Telling the Bees a colony of bees in a ceramic beehive topped with a large mask outside of het Glazen Huis takes care of the archive of Hans de Vries, presented inside the glass pavillion, who in 1971 documented five beehives in meticulous detail for a year. The archive now exists under the care of the organisms described within it - with cables leading from the hive to a sensor module that records temperature, humidity and communication within the colony - creating a reciprocity of care that spans decades. To learn more about these works and the artist, click here.
[UPCOMING EVENTS]
Children's Workshop Everything Underground A Craft Workshop About Underground Life in Amstelpark Language: Dutch & English
Location: the Glazen Huis
Thursday 23 July • 10:00 - 12:00
for children 6 - 12 years
During this workshop, Floris Schönfeld will lead a collaborative craft project for children centered on the idea of the connection between people and their environment. In a place like Amstelpark, there are countless ways in which the ground is connected to various creatures and objects—plants and animals, hedges and playgrounds, and cables running underground. Together, we’ll explore this connection during a walk and then depict it through a large collaborative artwork. Read more and register here.
Demonstration and dialogue THE BEES TELL - On Agency and Indeterminacy
Sunday 26 July • 15:00 - 17:00
Location: the Glazen Huis
Language: English
Stef Veldhuis invites the public to join one of the moments of care for the bees. Afterward, he will engage in a conversation with Maia Kenney (Learn more about her here) about the project and relations between art, technologies and more than human agencies. Read more and register here.
Dialogues UMWELT Amstel
Sunday 23 August • 16:00 - 18:00
Location: the Glazen Huis
Language: Dutch
Floris Schönfeld will give a talk on his work UMWELT Amstel, in which he explores possible connections between various biological and technological entities in Amstelpark, and will discuss the concept of entanglement with ant expert Jan Peter Oudenampsen and weaver Esmé Hofman, both of whom were closely involved in the creation of UMWELT Amstelpark.
The Perennial Reading Group: Dialogues with UMWELT Amstel
Friday 28 August • 17:00 - 19:00
Location: the Glazen Huis
Language: English
The Perennial Reading Group is a nomadic, ongoing gathering for those drawn to sharing plant wisdom—eco-feminists, gardeners, , and all who feel kinship with the world. Led by Anne Diestelkamp, we will collectively read texts on relations between the bio and the technosphere. No preparation needed, all welcome.
Finissage Debate
13 September • 15:00 - 18:00
Location: the Glazen Huis
Artists Floris Schönfeld and Stef Veldhuis will engage in a conversation with invited guests about the relationships between technological and biological information networks, how underground roots and data cables are intertwined with one another, and about the relationships between art and the non-human actors with whom they collaborate. Guest speakers will be announced at a later date.
[COMMUNITY SECTION]
Open Call: Reschooling Spiral 2026–2027
The Reschooling Spiral is a year-long community practice program for artists, activists, educators, healers, troublemakers, farmers, researchers, community organisers, and cultural workers. For those who want to confront internalised colonial logics, and tune into other ways of being, organising, and relating to one another.
From September 2026 to June 2027 — moving through a full year of seasons, cycles, and practices — we gather bi-weekly in Amsterdam to:
· compost colonial conditioning
· metabolise complexity, contradictions, and grief
· relearn to sense and act relationally with one another, with land, with the living world
This is not a course with a clean curriculum. It is a slow, messy, difficult, and relational process. And it can only be done together.
