The New Rural Agenda is a space for the inhabitants of the earth and those who have been seeking sustainable living spaces to speak out and express their agency, as a concrete contribution to the crisis experienced by the world. Thus, the agendas that will be presented are entirely based on the diversity of practices in managing resources and culture that have been carried out by grassroots communities.
The question that New Rural Agenda discusses is how we understand the rural as a concept to talk about the future using two perspectives: firstly, cultural activists working at grassroots level are important figures in contextualizing cultural resources in their respective areas and in generating collective power in dealing with social and ecological issues. Secondly, rural is no longer a ‘fixed’ territory and ‘it is how its is’. Rural in truth is a locus that needs to be realized, understood, and created.
The locals’ critical ability to work with their surrounding resources as well as the agency of other-than-human has been successful in generating cultural capital that could solve various problems in their environment. This rural-based practice does not only work with resources in terms of ‘using’, but the practice also maintains and protects the sustainability of resources and the lives of its inhabitants. This effort has made the rural to be more flexible, and more resilient than some cities in dealing with for example the pandemic. As we look into our survival and future of living with the several challenges that we face today, amongst which climate justice, pandemic, and exclusion, then the rural area as a locus is something significant to be looked into and learned from.
However, another reality shows the opposite. The lack of global discussion on rural life by the elite policymakers shows a sign of looking at rural life as an object or a powerless entity, as merely a support for the city life. This way of thinking can be seen in the New Urban Agenda–initiated by the United Nations–that anticipates the increase of metropolitans in the world. Meanwhile, documenta fifteen–an important art world event–invites the Jatiwangi art Factory community and we see documenta as a stage for the local people to state that the center is rural.
Rurality and its resources, the natural and cultural assets, along with its inhabitants who have actively worked with culture as a way to intervene with their local problems–integrating it with the , could be the access to act collectively in proposing livable ways of being in this current and future life.
Soil Lab is a common agenda to support the existing activities of the Soil Culture Laboratory, which has been developed and maintained by the community. These efforts are carried out to address various ongoing crises, ensuring the survival and continuity of the community.
Soil Lab is a collective initiative to support the existing activities of the Soil Culture Laboratory, which has been developed and maintained by the community. These efforts are carried out to address various ongoing crises, ensuring the survival and continuity of the community.
Harvesting also means establishing a series of platforms to both produce and distribute knowledge itself. Knowledge is best cultivated among interlocal networks through various harvesting methods. Some specific harvesting approaches include the Commoning Agenda and the Soil Culture Lab in each site Residency Program.
The New Rural School is an artistic research program that conducted across several collective lands and plantations within the Lumbung Land network. It adopts the concept of “Pesantren,” utilizing the ‘nyantrik’ method—a learning approach that emphasizes deep bodily engagement and sensory immersion in activities led by the hosts of the land or farm.