← All work

ADEV: Amsterdam Danst Ergens Voor

De Valreep was an underground social centre located in the east of Amsterdam. Its home was a monumental building that was neglected by the local authorities. In 2011 a group of young activists squatted it, renovated the ruin and started hosting activities with the local community. Two years later this thriving social centre was under threat of eviction by local authorities. How could they raise awareness for their cause when previous squatter’s demonstrations had been brutally beaten down by police?

We planned a free street parade during the Amsterdam Dance Event as an alternative for the commercialization of Amsterdam and the Dutch dance scene. We called it Amsterdam Danst Ergens Voor (ADEV) and supported it with a website and a promotional movie. We hijacked the ADE-logo and squatted the iconic ADE-installation on Rembrandtplein with our own mascotte Cerberus, resulting in free publicity for our cause on local TV, news sites, newspapers, dance communities and international dance press.

By posing ADEV as an alternative to the ADE we created a legitimate reason to dance through the city centre for salvation of De Valreep. The mayor allowed our non-commercial alternative and ordered the police to co-operate and assist in traffic re-routing. Our event was the first dance parade Amsterdam had seen in 7 years. Despite the bad weather it saw an attendance of more than 1000 colourful protesters.

De Valreep gained a lot of supporters but has since been evicted. Meanwhile, ADEV has grown into an annual manifestation for more free space in Amsterdam, drawing thousands of supporters every year. Apart from our street rave we started initiatives such as Het Vrijplaatsenakkoord and projected our movie about the municipality’s new policies on city hall. I have since stepped down from the organisation, but the underground hasn’t been so alive in decades!



Photos: Elmer van der Marel, Mila Dijkema, Arthur de Smidt
Movie: Willem de Groot
Website and Design: Bennie
Sculpture, Art & Sound by The Amsterdam Underground, you know who you are 😉