The Honey Bank Project The Hague

The Honey Bank Project
consists of several components. Detailed information can be found on the website: www.honingbank.nl

The Queen Bank
Location: Stroom Den Haag (backyard), Maziestraat 12-14, The Hague
Closed since September 1, 2014

The Pollination Chamber
Location:
GEM / Fotomuseum Den Haag garden
Stadhouderslaan 43
The Hague
Opening:
Saturday, June 1, 2013

HONEY BANK ACTIVITIES 2013
The opening of the Queen Bank on Friday, June 22, 2012, marked the kickoff of the Honey Bank, a project by French artist Olivier Darné in collaboration with Emmanuelle Roule and Le Parti Poétique. The Honey Bank creates a community of people and bees, provides a public service in the form of plant and flower pollination, and produces queen bees, bee colonies, and honey. The project consists of two structures—The Queen Bank and The Pollination Chamber—and an ecological financing tool in the form of a Bee Savings Account.

Bee Savings Account
Join the community of people and bees! Everyone who wants to take part in creating a bee-friendly city is warmly welcome on Friday. You can play an active and significant role by opening a Bee Savings Account.

The Honey Bank raises awareness of the ecosystem we share with bees and the disappearance of natural resources, partly caused by our current society and economy. Darné sharpens the question of how economic values and money relate to ecological values. The project aligns with Stroom’s Upcycling program, a multi-year initiative focused on value creation and meaning in the built environment. The quest for more sustainable use of (public) spaces and materials requires not only technological solutions and new design methods but also a different mindset regarding existing organizational structures, our interactions, and our living environment.

The Honey Bank stretches the boundaries of what the art world defines as art in public space. It is a meeting place, an information center, and a relational artwork. In a sense, the Honey Bank (and especially the Pollination Chamber) can be seen as an experience machine (a magical nature experience paradoxically in the heart of the city). Above all, the Honey Bank is a project that invites participation.

The Queen Bank was the starting point of the project. On June 22, 2012—The Year of the Bee—the first bee colonies and queens were ceremoniously welcomed and given residence in the backyard of Stroom Den Haag on Maziestraat. Here, along with local beekeepers, about twenty queens and bee colonies are being raised to strengthen the bee population in The Hague and contribute to the urban ecosystem. The Queen Bank is the treasure chamber for the Honey Bank and will be operational for at least two years.

Opening a Bee Savings Account can be done via the crowdfunding website www.honingbank.nl, where background information about the project and the activity program is also available. By making a financial contribution, you become a member of the Honey Bank and make an active and significant contribution to the preservation of honeybees and the quality of the environment. The capital from the Bee Savings Account will finance the public Pollination Chamber, which will open on June 1, 2013, in the garden of the GEM in The Hague.

In 2011, visitors to the DAG HAP festival, organized by Stroom Den Haag in Erasmusveld, first encountered the Honey Bank. The first bank members—including Mayor Jozias van Aartsen—invested in the project and received honey harvested in Erasmusveld as a token of appreciation.

PROGRAM OVERVIEW 2012

November 17, 2012, 5 PM
First General Members Meeting of the Honey Bank
The program for this first General Members Meeting included a presentation of plans for 2013 by Olivier Darné, a lecture by researcher Jeroen van der Sluijs, and the transfer of seven new bee colonies from the Honey Bank to new beekeepers in The Hague.

November 16, 2012
Transfer of a bee colony to Mayor van Aartsen
Bee saver from the start, Mayor Jozias van Aartsen, received the first new bee colony for the city of The Hague.

July through September 2012
In July, August, and September, every Sunday afternoon from 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM, beekeepers from the Beekeepers Association of The Hague and surroundings were present at the Queen Bank to provide information about keeping honeybees in the city and raising queens (also on Wednesday afternoons in July).

Wednesday, August 1, 2012, 1 - 4 PM
Information afternoon at the Haags Milieucentrum
Staff from the Haags Milieucentrum were present at the Queen Bank to answer questions about bees and the situation in The Hague as part of The Year of the Bee.

Friday, June 22, 2012
The festive opening of the Queen Bank

Contact Honey Bank

Mirthe van Gelder
Project Coordinator Honey Bank
Stroom Den Haag

Phone: 070-3658985
Email: honingbank@stroom.nl

Partners Honey Bank The Hague

Studio Vruchtvlees: www.vruchtvlees.com
Stroom Den Haag: www.stroom.nl
Seeds: www.seeds.nl
Banque du miel: www.banquedumiel.org

The Honey Bank is made possible with thanks to: Fonds 1818, Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds, Beekeepers Association of The Hague and surroundings, Haags Milieucentrum; Pierre Gardent-Lisle and Sylvain Bonnet (Parti Poétique - construction of the Queen Bank)

MEDIA

Den Haag Centraal, February 7, 2014
AD/Haagsche Courant, November 19, 2012
Omroep West, November 9, 2012
AD/Haagsche Courant, August 3, 2012
De Telegraaf, August 2, 2012
AD/Haagsche Courant, June 23, 2012

'The Queen Bank.' A film by Enny Kleikamp-van Leeuwen. Also available on YouTube: click here