Blog Making Histories Super Diversity Mar02 2016, Amsterdam

Public Voting Session – The Result

Last Friday, on a sunny afternoon, people gathered in front of the wooden stage outside our containers, it was voting time! New European Domenique Himmelsbach de Vries invited the neighbourhood to decide on what artistic intervention he will work on over the next four months.

For a Friday evening the turn-out was pretty good; there were twenty people eager to learn more about the research projects Domenique was about to propose. There was Eurowine, other drinks and snacks. People chatted, passersby stopped and stayed out of curiosity.

There were four projects to be proposed. (1) Customize Europe; (2) The Ultra Common Enemy; (3) Euroshopper Cafe; and (4) a Pluriform Monument for the Future of Europe. See for a full description of these projects this previously posted article.

Domenique climbed on stage and presented enthusiastically, afterwards there was enough time for questions. Then the voting session started: in a special made ballot-box, marked with a light bulb (to underline the fact that attendees could pick a new idea), the completed forms were dropped.

The result: Domenique will start his first project on The Ultra Common Enemy. “People choose for a plan that is the most abstract. It’s more a research project with a clear question than a concrete proposal for a statue or intervention. It is very challenging, since I am not the first one working with this theme. For example Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Kurt Vonnegut and the Wachmen did it before. So it demands an idiosyncratic approach.”

Would you like to stay updated about this project, or do you have any tips? Send an e-mail to hello@neweuropeans.org with ‘Common Enemy’ in the title.

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