The VAi’s 2025–2026 season programme is ready for take-off. Including a completely new look!

This autumn we explore how a variety of voices shape our public space. In times of ecological and societal transitions, public space is never neutral. Our first major exhibition, Tamed Nature, investigates how green urban spaces embody power, history and social tensions. Guided walks, lectures and a sound performance make these themes tangible.

Discover the highlights in this newsletter. We are ready. Are you?

What forces, ideals and dreams determine the place that nature occupies in a city? Activism and civil protest influence how we deal with green spaces today, but this was also the case in the past. The exhibition Tamed Nature offers a unique perspective on the roots and future of urban greenery through the lens of Antwerp.

Join us on 16 September for the opening of the exhibition Tamed Nature. Curator and researcher Bart Tritsmans takes you on a journey through the story of the exhibition. While Eva Pfannes, co-founder and director of OOZE architects & urbanists, will give a lecture in which she will share her vision of nature in the city. Afterwards, you can chat in the bar and explore the exhibition.

On 9 October, the city poet of Antwerp,Esohe Weyden and sound artists Maarten Buyl and Raphael Malfliet share their works on the interaction between the built environment and nature. While Buyl and Malfliet play live from their album Niemandsland composed for the exhibition Tamed Nature, Weyden reads her new poetry written specially for this event.

Planning a trip to Venice in the coming months? Be sure to visit the 19th edition of the Biennale Architettura, the international high mass of contemporary architecture. Commissioned by the VAi, landscape architect Bas Smets and neurobiologist Stefano Mancuso present in the Belgian pavilion Building Biospheres. The exhibition investigates how the natural intelligence of plants can be used to produce an indoor climate.

For six months, the pavilion will serve as a prototype for this innovative research.

From 4 tot 6 September Decoratelier organizes together with the VAi, MolenbeekforBrusssels2030 and KANAL Centre Pompidou a symposium around Boring. The Brussels organisation founded by Jozef Wouters and Menno Vandevelde invite dwellers and expert readers to perform a drilling, read a soil sample and amplify the histories it contains.

The Living Frameworks exhibition examines the relationship between the built environment and the natural world. In an era where the consequences of human interventions in natural ecosystems are increasingly coming to light, HOP.office explores the role of architecture and urban planning as a mediator between two seemingly separate domains.

Join us on 21 October for the festive opening.

On Thursday 20 November 2025, the Flanders Architecture Institute organises its annual research day in De Singel in Antwerp. Entitled Hors catégorie, it explores how archival classifications shape – but also limit – our understanding of design heritage.