What is the potential of a study or reading group for providing a grounds for artistic production? Since 2012, Witte de With has been instrumental in founding various groups as part of its program, gathering on a regular basis at the (hidden) heart of the institution: the kitchen-library. Discussions lead by artists, curators, or philosophers explore, provoke and analyze texts central to specific research and practices closely related to our exhibition program. The clusters of knowledge generated through these frameworks are gathered as readers and shared amongst those invested in the group and the projects the group supports.

Different formats for the formation of groups and the exchange of texts are tested over the years, responding to the specific needs of an artist or of a student body. In the past few years, reading and study groups have included: three thematic philosophy reading groups organized together with Earsmus University's Centre for Art and Philosophy, the first one leading to the international research symposium Speculative Art Histories and the eponymous forthcoming publication; (m)other voices: the maternal as an attitude by artist Deirdre M. Donoghue, who founded the m/other voices foundation which explores relations between maternal -work, -experience, -thinking and -time and the production of knowledge within arts and beyond; debate and study sessions lead by Nana Adusei-Poku (Curatorial Fellow 2015) as part of NO HUMAS INVOLVED by artist collective HOWDOYOUSAYYAMINAFRICAN?. From autumn 2016 onwards, leading up to her 2017 operatic project The Ten Murders of Josephine, artist Rana Hamadeh founds a study group to both enact and expand upon enquiries core to her process.