The rights of nature advocate for recognising ecosystems and natural entities as legal persons with inherent rights. This perspective promotes environmental protection, ensuring ecosystems can thrive, regenerate, and maintain balance, fostering sustainable coexistence between humans and the natural world. A key element of modernity is the distinction between an author and an actor, whereby to speak ones own voice represents an authoritative moment. To speak in someone’s name is an act of authorisation, where representatives embody the will of those they represent, grounding political power in consent and artificial personhood.
Klaas Kuitenbrouwer
Klaas Kuitenbrouwer is the director of the Zoönomic Institute. Klaas is also a senior researcher in regenerative practices at het Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam and teaches theory at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy. He studied history but has always worked at the intersections of art, design, technology and ecology. In his work he is drawn to the frictions between different knowledge practices: technological, artistic, legal, organisational, scientific, and more-than-human. In recent years, he researched and curated, among other programs: Garden of Machines (2015), Gardening Mars (2017), Bot Club and the Neuhaus Temporary Academy for more-than-human knowledge (2019). This led to the initiation of the Zoöp project.