The Piet Zwart Institute houses the international Master programs of the Willem de Kooning Academy at Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences (RUAS). Since 1999 it has been dedicated to promoting study and research in the fields of art, design and art education.
The Piet Zwart Institute is part of the Willem de Kooning Academy (WdKA), an art school that can be found right at the heart of the design city of Rotterdam. The Academy’s origin dates back to 1753, and now — with over 2,000 students — it is one of the largest art academies in the Netherlands, offering both Bachelor’s and Master’s programs in Fine Art and Design. The Academy is part of the multi-sectoral Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences (RUAS), a dynamic knowledge institute for higher professional education with a variety of programs across all educational sectors and closely connected to developments in the metropolitan region of Rotterdam. Although part of the RUAS, Willem de Kooning Academy is autonomous in realising its goals and positioning its national and international profile.
WdKA’s Master’s programs are positioned within the Piet Zwart Institute (PZI), which currently hosts a little over 120 students. Named after the pioneering Dutch designer Piet Zwart, who worked experimentally across different media and contexts, the Institute offers a rich combination of in-depth specialisation and interdisciplinary exchange within an intimate learning environment. The programs of the Piet Zwart Institute are located in Rotterdam’s city centre, at Karel Doormanhof 45 and Wijnhaven 61. Students and staff come from around the globe and bring with them a variety of cultural influences and international connections. In addition to these international ties, the program maintains strong local connections to the city of Rotterdam, its history and ever-changing urban environment.
The Piet Zwart Institute houses four full-time Master programs, Interior Architecture: Research + Design (MIARD); Master of Arts in Fine Art and Design, which encompasses Fine Art (MFA) Lens-Based Media (LB) and Experimental Publishing (XPUB) and two part-time Master programs, Education in Arts (MeiA) and Master Design. Through uniquely tailored curricula combining collective learning, individual tutorials, practice-based research and theoretical inquiry, the programs educate professionals who have a critically reflective, innovative, questioning and imaginative approach to their work. Our graduates go on to not only establish themselves in their field, but also challenge and creatively define the parameters of their profession.
As an educational institute and cultural centre, the notion of ‘making public’ is core to the activities of PZI. Exhibitions, programming, conferences and publications on a national and international level are a means of sharing and expanding our research beyond the confines of academia. At the same time, the program provides the very necessary speculative space for reflection and knowledge-building that is only made possible through an academic framework like the Piet Zwart Institute.
The two-year Master of Fine Art (MFA) program at the Piet Zwart Institute is an HBO Masters offered by the Willem de Kooning Academy, which is part of the Hogeschool Rotterdam (Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences). The Piet Zwart Institute Master Fine Art (Master of Arts in Fine Art and Design, option Fine Art) educates […]
Master Interior Architecture: Research + Design, MIARD at the Piet Zwart Institute is an international post-graduate program that is part of the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam. MIARD is a two-year multidisciplinary course with a focus on practice-based research and spatial strategies in the field of interior architecture. We invite you to visit our […]
The Experimental Publishing master course (XPUB) focuses on the acts of making things public and creating publics in the age of post-digital networks. XPUB’s interests in publishing are therefore twofold: first, publishing as the inquiry and participation into the technological frameworks, political context and cultural processes through which things are made public; and second, how […]
The Master of Arts in Fine Art & Design: Lens-Based Media program focuses primarily on artistic and experimental lens-based practices (both still and moving image/animation) that embrace the use of artifice, formal and technical innovation, fictional strategies and other unconventional visual approaches to create new and meaningful visions of the world. We support visions that […]
Experimental and engaged practices in art and design educationThe MEiA programme is called ‘Education in Arts’, but in essence it is multidisciplinary. We pay attention to contemporary developments in art and design education, considering it to be an expanded and interdisciplinary field that also includes socially engaged practices in art. The programme pays attention to […]
The Master Design is a two-year part-time course. It is centred on doing design research. This research seeks answers to self-defined design questions, and combines methods of making, gaining in-depth knowledge, storytelling and positioning. At the Master Design you learn to do design research to seek answers to a self-defined design question. You combine methods […]
Marie Caye, Anna Kieblesz, Yezi Lin, Maia Liu, Lilian Ptacek, Johannes Hugo StollWith Cannach MacBride Image credit: poster by Yezi and Maia working with a zine compiled by Anna from materials made by all [Image description: A graphic black and white poster with various sizes and styles of handwritten typography overlaid on a collage of […]
This group exhibition by first year students brings a selection of works and works-in-progress to the Polderland Garden of Love and Fire. Emerging from “Domestic Territories,” an intensive 6-month research project carried out across Flevoland and led by Studio Ossidiana. The exhibition explores the post-natural condition of the Netherlands’ youngest province. Join us and discover […]
Congratulations to Lens-Based Media student Sam Koopman who received an EYE ResearchLabs award for Most Urgent Work with his short film Dear Moritz. The hybrid form short film invites us to observe and reflect at a chance encounter between humans in public space. An unplanned story exploring power, privilege, colonial pasts and present realities. Screened […]
Time: April 11, 18.00hr / 6pmLocation: Piet Zwart Institute Master Fine Art, Karel Doormanhof 45, RotterdamLanguage: English Reenactment and the lost object: documentary, art and restaging reality This lecture will be prefaced by a brief introduction to British artist John Keane’s elliptical portraits of real subjects (politicians, public figures). Keane’s subjects, pixelated, blurred and buried under layers […]
Exhibition duration: 04.04 — 10.09.2023 ITALY: A New Collective Landscape The challenges facing us at this global moment and the ongoing ecological and social transformations are the starting point for the work of young Italian designers presented by Italy: A New Collective Landscape. Produced by the ADI Design Museum, the exhibition is curated by Angela […]
Time: March 29, starting at 17.30Location: Piet Zwart Institute Master Fine Art, Karel Doormanhof 45, RotterdamLanguage: English Mercedes Azpilicueta is a visual and performance artist from Buenos Aires living and working in Amsterdam. Her artistic practice gathers various characters from the past andthe present who address the vulnerable or collective body from a decolonial feminist perspective. In fluid, associative connections […]
XPUB & PNF present:ConsoleSpecial Issue XX Launch19:00-21:0031.03.23 Page Not FoundBoekhorststraat 126-1282512 CT Den Haaghttps://page-not-found.nl/ Console is an oracle; an emotional first aid kit that helps you help yourself.Console invites you to open the box and discover ways of healing;Console provides shelter for your dreams, memories and worries.Face the past and encounter your fortune.Console gives you […]
Time: March 10, 17.00 – 18.00Location: Piet Zwart Institute Master Fine Art, Karel Doormanhof 45, RotterdamLanguage: English We’re excited to co-host along with WET a conversation with filmmakers Ernst Karel and Veronika Kusumaryati about their augmented sound work Expedition Content (2020) sceening at WET’s space in Rotterdam South. Anthropologist and educator Sander Hölsgens will join […]
Piet Zwart Institute’s MEiA heartily invites you to Affective Pedagogies, a public event hosted by TENT. at Friday March 10. Affective Pedagogies aims to explore the relational and reparative potential of affect around a set of pedagogical questions. Performer and choreographer Raoni Muzho Saleh will lead a call and response moaning session. Scholar Sanne Koevoets will give a […]
Location: Wijnhaven 61, fourth floor, MIARD studios We are pleased to invite you to join us during our annual Open Day at MIARD. Our Open Day this year is in-person. During the day you have a chance to learn about the program, ask questions, and speak with the Course Director and Coordinator, tutors, students, and alumni. […]
XPUB will host an online open day Monday 6th of February, 2023 We will host two online sessions at 10:00 (UTC+1) and 17:00 (UTC+1). You can register by writing to l.j.drost-robbins@hr.nl.
Applications now open for the Master of Education in Arts for the academic year 2023/2024 Deadlines:March 7, 2023: Priority deadline Dutch and EU applicants.May 10, 2023: Final deadline Dutch and EU applicants. We review applications, interview and accept candidates on a rolling basis from February 2023 until May 2023, until all positions in the cohort are filled. We strongly […]
Join us for the Piet Zwart Institute (PZI) online open day which will take place on Saturday February 11, from 10am–3pm. Throughout the day, both the Willem de Kooning Academy (WdKA) and the Piet Zwart Institute (PZI) master studio spaces will be open to the public. It is a day when many PZI staff and students are […]
https://issue.xpub.nl/19/index.html 18:00–21:00Leeszaal, Rijnhoutplein 3, Rotterdam West. Welcome! We are the first year students of the Experimental Publishing Master of Piet Zwart Institute, invite every librarian (librarians of their own library) to garden Leeszaal and discover what this library offers. We will see behind the curtains of how the unwanted books are kept in this library. […]
pagedjs is a rendering tool for previewing, inspecting and designing a PDF in the browser, that is known for specifically accommodating designers using web-to-print techniques in their publications and book making practice. Julie and Julien both work as developers on the project, so we can also ask them about Paged.js as an open source project, […]
This workshop will introduce the concept of site-writing based on two locations in Rotterdam, Hof Van Noord and the Van Nelle Factory building. Site-writing is the analysis of space based on the body’s perception. The term was coined by Jane Rendell in Site-Writing: The Architecture of Art Criticism (London: Bloomsbury, 2010.) The technique is centered on a heightened attention […]
Time: Thursday October 20, 2022, 16.00hr/4pm, free admissionLocation: Karel Doormanhof 45, a short walk or bike-ride from Rotterdam Central Station. Lyndon Barrois Jr. is an artist and writer based in Pittsburgh, PA where he is an Assistant Professor of Art at Carnegie Mellon University. He is half of LAB:D, with artist Addoley Dzegede, with whom he has collaboratively […]
The Piet Zwart Institute Master Fine Art is thrilled to welcome artist Addoley Dzegede as our very first Fulbright researcher-in-residence. Addoley is a Ghanaian-American artist who grew up in South Florida. With her Fulbright project Exploring textile lineages in Dutch collections through dyeing, batik, and wax print histories, Addoley takes Dutch museums and collections as […]