RASL launched in 2015 with a small group of enthusiastic and engaged people, and has grown steadily. Currently over 50 staff members across the three different institutions are directly involved in RASL, 114 students take part in the Dual Degree and over 60 students have taken the minor. RASL is an open community, inspiring and supporting staff members and students who want to collaborate with other educational or social partners.

RASL regularly develops workshops, participates in or redesigns courses, and organizes conferences (a national conference in 2018 and an international conference in 2019). RASL continues to expand through the commitment of its students and the enthusiasm of its partners who, increasingly, seek to develop joint collaborations and initiatives with us.

ON EVENTS

National Conference: Symposium Rotterdam Arts & Sciences Lab 2015 – 2018, during the 15th ELIA Biennial Conference, November 21-24, 2018, in Rotterdam

In 2018 we looked back on the insights gained from two years of RASL. About sixty interested colleagues from education and research, as well as governmental partners, gathered at BlueCity for the launch of RASL Compositions (publications.rasl.nu). Keynote speaker Marleen Stikker shared the challenges and opportunities of transdisciplinary collaborations, and CLUB GEWALT staged a wild musical ceremony, offering RASL Compositions to the goddess Artemis.

International Conference: Transdisciplinary Compositions – Contemporary Challenges, International Arts and Sciences Conference, October 17-18, 2019, held at the Kunsthal Rotterdam and Erasmus University College 

The aim of this conference was to explore how languages and practices of the arts and sciences can be shared, translated, and re-composed across disciplines in order to address contemporary challenges at the nexus of behaviour, space and environment. During the conference, internationally renowned guests gave keynote lectures, performances, workshops and master classes based on their transdisciplinary work.
 

RASL Events

RASL Events is a platform where art meets science. RASL Events organizes talk shows, podcasts, city tours, lectures and conferences in collaboration with various academic and cultural organizations in the Netherlands. For students, RASL Events is a platform where they can display their talents and learn to operate in the cultural sector, as well connect with and learn from professionals. For stakeholders and the general public, RASL Events offers the opportunity to learn more about transdisciplinary collaboration between artists and scientists and how these interconnections benefit society. (read more)
  

Library Sessions,

Library Sessions, initiated by Dual Degree students, uses the serenity of a university library to enable new forms of enjoying music. Professional artists and performers engage the audience in novel ways in an intimate acoustic setting. This results in the creation of a ‘musical space’ in which creativity, curiosity, and their interrelations are celebrated.

Art & Activism

Can the performing arts contribute to social awareness? Do we have the courage to become active and co-responsible? In Art & Activism, speakers and performers inspire and challenge us through presentations, discussions and engaging performances. This is an open invitation to share what we, as makers, can do, and what our function can be in today and tomorrow’s world.

ON RESEARCH
& EDUCATION

Workshop Zurich University of the Arts, Spring 2020

In March 2020, RASL conducted a workshop at the MA Transdisciplinary Studies (Zurich University of the Arts, ZHdK). Two activities were organised, a lecture on transdisciplinarity across the arts and sciences, and a workshop in which strategies and mechanisms from music composition practice were used to foster creative transdisciplinary collaborations.

Boundary Work, ELIA Biennial Conference, November 20, 2020

The practice-led workshop, Exploring Transdisciplinary Compositions in the Arts and Sciences, introduces and experiments with the compositional modes of verbal notation and scoring. It is based upon ongoing research to collaboratively develop proposals and instructions for actions within arts and design education that may enable us to confront the ecological, social, and cultural challenges we face in the present and future.

Architecture of Informed Artistry programme, Codarts Honours Programme

These programmes offer an informative, interactive collection of perspectives exploring the intersections of music with other knowledges. Participants are invited to share, discuss and challenge viewpoints on musicianship in general and their own positions in particular.

ACCELERATION LAB, WdKA Honours Programme

In WdKA’s Acceleration Lab the central questions are: What is innovation, and what does it mean to innovate within the context of art, design, and education? What are the preconditions for innovative methods to exist? And how can we locate current social, cultural, (geo-)political, ecological, and economic conditions that might form, or even necessitate, an “innovative” artistic or design methodology in the near future?

Incubator programme, Codarts

Incubator is a cross-over project that involves all of Codarts´ bachelor students, and focusses on transdisciplinarity in the performing arts. The RASL team conducts a series of innovative practice-based workshops to prepare the participants for this transdisciplinary endeavour. Three main aspects are addressed: collaboration, research and creative strategies.

Thinking lived themes: making philosophy inclusive, Erasmus School of Philosophy

The RASL minor questions and disrupts existing dichotomies that are foundational in many scientific disciplines, which led to the involvement of RASL in this new BA course at EsPhil. In which a mainstream ‘style’ or ‘method’ of philosophizing is problematized by considering how thinking about a new theme affects how we think, and through encounters with everyday concrete experiences, transdisciplinarity, fiction and bodily experiments.

ON (PROVISIONAL) PEDAGOGIES

The RASL minor is based on an innovative approach to pedagogy in the context of transformative transdisciplinarity across and beyond the arts and sciences. Provisional pedagogies revolve around multiplicity, situatedness and temporality, and counter the notion of a predetermined and standardized pedagogy. These provisional pedagogies find their uneven footing in zones of tension–where we make explicit and work in and from the frictions, conflicts and paradoxes inherent to transdisciplinary practice. (read more)

Learning Labs in Higher Music Education

TAMARA RUMIANTSEV is doing her PhD on learning labs in higher music education. At a time in which their professional environment is rapidly changing, musicians need to initiate new applications with their art and establish (inter- and transdisciplinary) connections and collaborations that are relevant to our present and future society. TAMARA's research centres on pedagogy and teacher/student roles within conservatories. These educational institutions are an important setting for the shift from the traditional focus on achievement, assessment and self-discipline, to a participatory and collaborative learning culture that stimulates innovation.

Arts & Culture Programme, EUC

The Arts & Culture Programme (ACP) is an extra-curricular programme at Erasmus University College, which serves as a testing ground for innovative education between the arts and sciences, with an emphasis on student-led and co-creation pedagogies and teaching collaborations between scholars and artists. Many of the pedagogical interventions developed in the ACP influenced both the theoretical underpinnings and the educational formats employed in the RASL minor.

From Interdisciplinarity to Transdisciplinarity

Dr. CHRISTIAN VAN DER VEEKE is a senior lecturer in Humanities at Erasmus University College and is the Academic Director of the Erasmus Honours Programme (EHP). The transition from interdisciplinary to transdisciplinary education is central to his vision of the EHP, which CHRISTIAN elaborates as following: “What if we—as teachers—leave education to the students themselves, instead of spelling it out for them? What you need, I think, are diverse teams—socially, disciplinarily, culturally—of young motivated individuals, and to provide them with space and time to experiment together.”

From Me-Search to We-Search

JOB TER HAAR is a research coach at Codarts Rotterdam who is invested in transdisciplinary education. Job comments: "From me-search to we-search in re-search—this is (in short) the transition we are currently witnessing in student research at Codarts. Students explore the relationship between the performing arts and other disciplines, and seek out new connections with society. My job as a research coach has become much more interesting!"