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Open Call - Deadline 16 Jan 2026

Gathering dates: May 9 -10, 2026
Masseria Sant’Agapito, Lucera (Foggia, Italy)

Vessel and CLIMAVORE x Jameel at RCA are looking for expressions of interest to join our gathering Acts of Maintenance: Small-Scale Practices for Climate Justice on May 9 -10 in Masseria Sant’Agapito.

Over the past years, small-scale arts organisations have been playing an active role in the context of climate justice, resilience and adaptation. Through the embeddedness of their processes and programmes, they have the potential to shed light on the interconnectedness of species and communities of humans and non-humans, and the role of art and culture in the context of planetary health. In the face of the environmental crisis, arts organisations and institutions have been encouraged to rethink their operations and ways of working radically, but what does this existential transformation mean for organisations of different scales, and across different geographies?

Over two days of workshopping, deep listening, walking, cooking and eating, we will bring together peers and colleagues to explore the following questions:

• How can arts organisations embody activist cultures in the context of environmental justice?
• How can we foster institutions that act as a catalyst for environmental justice-based actions?
• What does responsiveness mean in the context of climate justice and adaptation?
• How can arts organisations come together in the face of ecological loss and grief?

We would like to address these questions from the perspective of small-scale arts organising (and artists practicing in this field), in a generative and nurturing space to explore methods, challenges and possible collaborations across actors and organisations of similar scale and infrastructure. With this two-day multifaceted gathering, we would like to bring to the fore similar projects and initiatives that swarm in the undergrowth of the art scene, feeding and nourishing the sector from below.

We will be joined by Cooking Sections (CLIMAVORE), Gaetano Carboni (Pollinaria - Civitella Casanova, Italy), Raluca Voinea (The Experimental Station for Research on Art and Life – Primăverii, Siliștea Snagovului, Romania).
More contributors to be announced soon.

Expression of interest

Submissions should be sent by 16 January to info@vesselartproject.org with a file named “Applicant Name_Acts of Maintenance” including:
Name and pronouns
Location where you are based
Organisations you are affiliated with
Short description 250 words of how your experience, practice or work responds to our call

Hospitality

Food will be provided.
Travel will be self-arranged. We can provide letters for funding applications if required.

4 bursaries for accommodation (2 nights) are available.
To apply for a bursary please send us a short statement (100 words max) explaining how this bursary is going to support your participation, and why joining this gathering is important to you. We encourage you to apply for a bursary ONLY if the cost of accommodation would prevent you from joining.

This event is promoted by Vessel Art Project and CLIMAVORE x Jameel at RCA as part of their collaboration on Monoculture Meldown, a long-term project that advocates for the recognition of free adaptation and cultivation of less water-dependent seeds as a key tool for the agriculture of the future, the preservation of cultural heritage in times of ecological crisis. To share, unlearn and expand practices, we take our collaboration on this project as a starting point to bring our reflection at the intersection of environmental justice and the practices and roles of small arts organisations.

Climavore and Monoculture Meltdown

Climavore is a research platform and agency that questions how to eat as humans change climates. Since the Industrial Revolution and especially after WWII, seasons have been shifting at unexpected rates. New seasons are emerging asking for foods addressing droughts, polluted seas or exhausted soils. CLIMAVORE Stations expand the development of projects initiated by Cooking Sections. CLIMAVORE x Jameel at RCA is a research initiative that reimagines foodways for drylands and wetlands. A partnership between CLIMAVORE and Community Jameel at the RCA, it advances ecological networks to produce new knowledge and action towards spatial justice. Monoculture Meltdown is is a long-term project that advocates for the recognition of free adaptation and cultivation of less water-dependent seeds as a key tool for the agriculture of the future, the preservation of cultural heritage in times of ecological collapse, and ultimately, the rights of future generations. It brings together diverse practices from agroecology, advocacy, law, and contemporary art to support the transition of food systems to fewer water dependencies in the face of the climate crisis. It fosters the idea of promiscuous genealogies: forms of plant exchange allowing phenotypes to freely express and differences across specimens not to be standardised.