OT301 was one of the first venues I went to when I moved to the Netherlands, I’ve seen fantastic modern music and especially jazz at this place. I’ve seen various alternative concerts here and also French black and white films. Every week there’s something new to explore at this place.
When you reach the venue it won’t be obvious you are there…You must head down a small pathway to a back house in order to get into the actual place. It was squatted by artists at the end of the 90s and took of. I could tell you more but I’ll just let their own words do the talking:
The OT301/EHBK is a big adventurous project that started in 1999 when we squatted the building with a group of artists. We squatted the building to create a new platform where artists could live and work together and could work on a public programming that offers a stage to ‘experimental’, ‘new’, ‘alternative’ art, music, film, dance, theatre, workshops and other sorts of performances and shows we choose to put on.
Everything we do is based on the fact that we are a creative non-profit organization. That doesn’t mean that we don’t need money to pay our bills but it means that nobody in our building is making a lot of money and most of the income is used to maintain and develop our building and organization.
Within our building/organization we have 24 members and all together we share the responsibility to maintain and secure everything that happens in our building. We are not just a place where people rent an office or studio, everybody is expected to contribute to the group because otherwise we can not exist.
Besides sharing the responsibility for the building and protecting its vision everybody is working on his/her own projects within the building.
Some project examples that we are working on:
01) Studios (concerts, theatre, performance, dance, markets, workshops etc)
02) Gallery (for art projects)
03) Cinema (for a great film programming)
04) Peper (vegan organic culture kitchen)
05) Health space (for rehearsals, workshops, training of body and mind)
06) Soundstudios (rehearsal spaces for bands, producers, sound artists)
07) Tennis club bookstore (small independent book store)
08) Various studios for artists (painters, photographers, costume designers etc)
09) Workshops (breakdance, trapeze, shiatsu etc)
10) Ventilatieruimte (for organizing workshops, lectures, brainstorms etc)
11) Go Green
If you visit our building please respect the following simple rules:
01) No drugs (dealing or using)
02) No tagging
03) No violence
04) No weapons
05) No noise or garbage outside, please respect our neighbors
06) Please park your bikes not to close to our building
07) No stealing
08) No sexual aggression
09) No vandalism
10) No alcohol under 18 years
11) Follow instructions of OT301 crew when asked
12) No racism
13) Don’t take your drinks outside