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HAPPY EARTH DAY! 🌍
In celebration of Earth Day, EUNIC NL invited its cluster members to share a selection of recommendations centred around all things earth. From exhibitions and research projects to poetry, the selection brings together different ways of engaging with the topic.
Finish Cultural Institute recommends:
State of Wander: Towards Environmental Restoration
Berlin-based, Finnish artist Terike Haapoja is part of an exhibition State of Wander, research-based, cross-disciplinary contemporary art project initiated and conceived by guest curator Anna Bitkina and developed in collaboration with Annette de Vries, Associate Director of Research, Collection and Programming at Paleis Het Loo. The exhibition reflects on how historical displays of nature and designed environments shape contemporary thinking about ecological systems, inviting audiences to rethink human relationships with the natural world, history and cultural heritage.
Location Paleis Het Loo
17th April –27 September 2026
More information https://finncult.be/save-the-date-terike-haapoja-at-paleis-het-loo/
The Irish Embassy recommends:
Listen to the Land Speak
Manchán Magan
Listen to the Land Speak (2022) by the late Manchán Magan is a profound exploration of Irish landscape, language, mythology, and ancestral wisdom.
His book has been adapted to an RTÉ documentary and has won Best Cinematography at the 2025 Galway Film Fleadh.
Buy here: https://www.bol.com/nl/nl/p/listen-to-the-land-speak/9300000111829442/
Ukrainian Institute recommends:
SHUM
Go A
Shum by the Ukrainian-based electronic music group got them to 5th place in the 2022 Eurovision Song Contest. Based on a traditional spring ritual song, it reflects the cycle of seasons and the awakening of nature. This Earth day the Ukrainian institute shares a playlist of Earth-related songs – head along to their page for the full list!
Listen to SHUM here: https://link.deezer.com/s/334025odLJ7GmqhNZIATx
Czech Centre recommends:
After the largest forest fire in the history of the Czech Republic in the summer of 2022, the Bohemian Switzerland National Park is recovering. Scientists from the Institute of Botany of the Czech Academy of Sciences are closely monitoring vegetation growth in the affected areas and have reported that the forest is recovering at an extraordinary rate. Starting this year, the new cross-border Hřebenovka trail has opened, running across the Czech-German border from Hřensko to Schmilka. Along the trail, visitors can admire the beautiful wilderness and a section of the forest destroyed by the fire. Also, this year, Hřebenovka was awarded the ERA certificate by the European Hiking Federation, classifying it among the best European treks. For visitors, this means walking a safe and breathtaking path through the national park.
Read the full article here: https://www.hrebenovka.com/en/post/news-from-h%C5%99ebenovka
DutchCulture recommends:
Location DOMO
The pop-up photo exhibition will be open until May 17th, on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 13:00h to 17:30h.
Please note: The exhibition will not open on Wednesday, 22 April.
There will also be a book launch on: 7 May, 16:00 – 18.30h
Link to the exposition information: https://www.domoculture.com/activities/plastic-sea-perfect-storm
Plastic Sea, Perfect Storm. The Europeans
‘Plastic Sea, Perfect Storm’ is the latest chapter to The Europeans photo-documentary project portraying modern Europe. Photographer Rob Hornstra and writer and filmmaker Arnold van Bruggen capture an apocalyptic landscape behind the scenes of vegetable production. It definitely made me want to grow more of my own tomatoes.
Polish Culture recommends:
In 2021, Malgorzata Lebda, a Polish poet, a fiction writer and ultramarathon runner, ran 1,047 km (651 miles) — the entire length of Poland’s longest river, the Vistula — from its source in the Beskid Mountains to its mouth at the Baltic Sea. She set out to run as a poet, not as an athlete, using the rhythms of her own body as a means of understanding and connecting with the rhythms of the river’s waters, now under threat of environmental ruin.
Malgorzata grew up in a hamlet in the Beskid Mountains and now lives in a meadow house in the Suwałki Gap, on Poland’s northeastern border. She is the author of several poetry collections. Mer de Glace, translated into English by Mira Rosenthal (Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2026), received the prestigious Wisława Szymborska Award in 2022, and her most recent poetry book, Dunaj. Chyłe pola, was awarded the Kościelski Foundation Prize in 2025. Olga Tokarczuk has written of Małgorzata’s work: “Małgorzata Lebda’s poetry never ceases to amaze the reader. Even a chance encounter with it imperceptibly creates an everlasting connection. As eternal as the bond between the frozen sea and the forest.”
In 2023, Lebda published her prose debut, Łakome (Voracious), which received numerous nominations and awards. The novel has been translated into English by Antonia Lloyd-Jones (Linden Editions, 2025), and a film adaptation is due for release in 2027.
Her books have been translated into numerous languages, including English, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, Finnish, Danish, Ukrainian and Serbian. She is currently working on her second novel.
The chosen poem is taken from Mer de Glace, Fitzcarraldo Editions 2026, translated by Mira Rosenthal.
G E O G R A P H Y
It’s the job of the senses to turn into words.
They tend to be those like: chestnut, cardamom, chalk,
fuck; they can also be names of rivers: Belaya, Ob.
For years the names of rivers have brought us order. A refrain
about moisture, a science of neglect, of language, or a whisper
that speaks the dialect of maps: Mer de Glace, the Carpathians,
Cluj-Napoca, Bolechowicka Valley, Wrzeszcz, Wolski Forest,
Lea Street – but don’t bother searching for order or moderation there.
This is: tectonics, geography of what yields to erosion, what
changes state, what finds itself affected, this is, right here.
Hey, look – a hand traces
circles on skin; bark; fur,
and never gets enough.
Buy the whole book here: https://fitzcarraldoeditions.com/books/mer-de-glace/
Yunus Emre recommends:
Nomadic and Dutch Water Cultures, Kaan Korkmaz
The project ‘Nomadic and Dutch Water Cultures’ of visual artiest Kaan Korkmaz proposes to brings Dutch and nomadic perspectives on water into direct dialogue, weaving together history, culture, and lived experience to inspire more hopeful futures. It is rooted in deep archival and field research but ultimately will take the form of an immersive, participatory artwork that reconnects people with water on personal, cultural, and even spiritual levels.
Read the proposal here:
