inside

When we look for a refuge in the wild, to go outdoors, away from the city, away from our busy lives, this refuge is not a permanent one. It is merely a short escape (which we really needed?) before we return again, and nothing has changed.

But we also turn this concept around. We bring plants into our houses and into our offices that supposedly come straight from the wild. We like 'exotic' plants, grown locally in greenhouses. They are said to have a calming effect and to make you more productive, and even happier.

The city people of the Netherlands love being in and around their cities. Especially the ones that are paying high rents in the central areas. They tell you how much they enjoy the business of the city; the amount of things to do, all the friends that are close by. And while this life seems amazing and fulfilling, they do feel the urge to take shelter form it from time to time.

Everybody has their reasons for it, it can be the pressure of joining that has become too much, or just being overstimulated for example. But what they all seem to long for is to take refuge in the ‘wild’. People go out to the woods or to the beach to escape the city. Now that the Netherlands doesn’t really have any ‘wild’, what are they looking for exactly?

The call to and romanticising of the ‘wild nature’ has been present since at least the 18th century. But this form of refuge gets another layer with the looming climate crisis, and the cultivation that has been one of the sources for it.

REBUIDING RETURNING RECREATING

Not only the place where the refuge is directed to, but also the refuged place changes.

And he tried with all his strength to stay upright. Head in the air. Even though he could hardly breathe. Even though, despite all the good nutrition he had been offered, he felt weak and stiff. It was Tuesday.
` The day the verdict was delivered. It had been exactly two weeks since he had last seen the person who was first three desks behind him. She had not looked well for some time. Pale, skinny, dead ends. The office was tough.
` Eventually they would all leave. Replaced one by one for newer, younger ones.
` The door to the office opened and a man in a green suit stepped in.

What happens to a place when things have left it?

The empty space will be filled. These can be new things, or copies of the old things.

When we remove things, we often do this because we want something to change. Either when we replace our broken vacuumcleaner by a new one. Or when we try to remove a government from office in hopes of a new (more suitable) leadership.
Any case of removal is one of replacement. When there is an empty space, it gets filled up - think of what happens inside the vacuumcleaner. It doesn't need to happen right away, but in time abandoned buildings get overgrown. Empty closets get filled.

It could be a practise to start removing things, and see which other things replace them.