“It’s bigger than Hip Hop”: We’ve launched the Culture Capsule!
We are very excited to have successfully launched the Culture Capsule. The Culture Capsule will serve as a digital memory of the Dutch hip hop & urban culture scene, built by digitising and inventarising Dutch hip hop culture.
On the 9th of October, the hip hop community from all over the country came together at the Academy Building in Utrecht to give feedback and first reactions on what had been built so far. The Culture Capsule is a work in progress, with its creation depending on the fruitful and vibrant collaboration between the various pockets of the Dutch scene and the organisations involved.
During the launch, Sherlock Telgt, Kim Dankoor, Andrey ‘Dosha’ Grekov, and Claudia Marinelli shared why archiving “The Culture” is essential. Many memories and stories from Dutch hip hop legends will get lost if they are not preserved. It is also crucial to use this opportunity to collect the lesser known stories, moments and movements of the scene to offer a more comprehensive history of Dutch hip hop and urban culture.
We also had the pleasure of having Dastan Abdali, a PhD candidate at Re/presenting Europe, speak on the academic relevance of creating a hip hop archive, such as Culture Capsule. He mentions that the influence the scene carries is bigger than just hip hop. By using historical examples such as Zombie Squad, he discusses hip hop’s influence on identity formation, political activism, and belonging.
It was great to see the amount of enthusiasm from many of our attendees. This was demonstrated by the fact that one of the key concerns was how we can ensure that the archive will continue in the future once the research project Re/Presenting Europe finishes.
On the same day, we had the honour of welcoming interdisciplinary artist Bocafloja to take us through one of his documentaries “Después de Mañana” and share excerpts from his newly released book “Del Mondongo al Ojalá”. Inspirational discussions were had and thoughts were exchanged.
We want to give a big shout-out and thank you to Imani Dap for developing the beautiful website!
We would also like to thank Sherlock, Kim, Andrey, Claudia, Bram, Rachel, and Dastan as well as everyone who attended and shared their thoughts.