We – Denisa Kollarová and Anna van Lingen – live in an era in which there are not many carefully constructed playgrounds. We don’t like what we see. Have we – city decision makers, architects, designers, parents, friends – forgotten to be critical? There are so many architects, artists and thinkers of the past who have proven that a playground can be much more than just generic plastic structures placed randomly, constructed by simply flipping through the pages of play equipment catalogues.

We have the right to public space, to play, to playgrounds! Tools of Imagination is inspired by the design philosophy of Dutch architect Aldo van Eyck. The project explores playground design through several media: a publication, a series of lectures, an original adopted climbing frame by van Eyck and a video work made in cooperation with the Rijksmuseum.

Van Eyck’s exceptional designs have influenced generations of children at play in Amsterdam. After the Second World War, van Eyck dedicated himself to developing a web of over 700 playgrounds scattered across the city, in order to give children their own recognizable domain.

Nowadays only a few play elements remain. An important aspect of Aldo van Eyck’s designs is his strive to stimulate the imagination and ingenuity of the child, which is visible in the abstract shapes of his play elements.

seventeenplaygrounds.com

Thanks to support of Creative Industries Fund NL

This event is a part of the Off Programme – open space devoted to workshops, interventions, and other presentations and activities related to graphic design. The authors are solely responsible for the nature of this event. The program is subject to change.