Around the world, communities and environments sustain the impacts of mass travel: ecological degradation, cultural commodification, the displacement of communities and more. Yet tourism also has the potential to connect people, foster cultural resilience and restore natural balance.

The Rethinking Tourism Network (RTN) has developed from An Urgent Situation (2021–2024), a PRAKSIS project probing artists, architects and other creatives’ potential and actual contributions to needed changes in the tourism industry’s infrastructure. Building on this, the RTN connects a transdisciplinary constellation of people and projects in search of new models of travel and exchange—practices rooted in care, solidarity, and local knowledge.

What is the Network Doing?

Crossing continents, the RTN helps support the work of each member organisation. The RTN develops residencies, conferences, podcasts, publications and other research-led public formats that connect artistic, academic and community-based knowledge. In 2025–2026, members are testing the network’s longer-term form, agendas and methodologies through monthly digital meetings and two in-person research strands in Bali, Indonesia and Lofoten, Norway.

2026 update
The Rethinking Tourism Network is currently developing two connected strands: a publication emerging from the November 2025 Bali research programme and conference, and a Lofoten project taking place in September 2026 with PRAKSIS, KORO, Nordnorsk Kunstnersenter and local partners. The Lofoten strand will explore tourism, planning, public space, community knowledge and artistic practice, with the aim of developing an atlas/guide for communities, artists, planners and decision-makers.

Recent and upcoming activity includes:

Cultural Heritage and Identity
November 2025
Research programme in Bali. Hosted by Samong Haven

This intensive research and networking programme brought together artists, researchers and practitioners to explore authentic and responsible cultural heritage practices in the tourism-saturated context of Bali. The programme included workshops, visits, meetings, collaborative working, writing, video interviews and artistic research.

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Rethinking Nationhood through Tourism, Heritage and Ecology
10-12 November 2025
Conference in Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia. Held in collaboration with Warmadewa University

This three-day conference explored how tourism contributes to the construction, contestation and reimagining of national identity, with particular attention to cultural heritage, ecological change and the pressures facing places such as Bali.

Placemaking for the Future: Art and Sustainable Tourism in Lofoten
September 2026
Research programme in Lofoten, Norway. Developed in collaboration with KORO (Public Art Norway), Nordnorsk Kunstnersenter, LoVE Utvikling and Nordland Fylkeskommune

This project will explore tourism, planning, public space, community knowledge and artistic practice in Lofoten. Through meetings, workshops, research, public conversations and artistic contributions, the project will map different perspectives on tourism development and work towards an atlas/guide for use by communities, artists, planners and decision-makers.

Partners & Contributors

Featured

PRAKSIS is an Oslo-based transnational arts and culture catalyst that fosters inclusive, cross-disciplinary collaboration and public dialogue on urgent social and creative issues through residencies, partnerships, open programming and publishing.

Samong Haven is a developing centre for culture and learning in Northwest Bali, envisioned as a socially responsible destination rooted in community, culture, and conservation.

KORO (Public Art Norway) is the national agency for public art, producing and promoting artworks in public spaces across Norway and supporting community-based projects through initiatives such as LOK.

Lusaka Contemporary Art Centre (LuCAC) is an artist-run foundation in Zambia advancing contemporary art and cultural research through exhibitions, residencies, and public programmes.

NNKS (North Norwegian Art Centre) is the regional centre for contemporary art in Northern Norway, fostering artistic exchange and public engagement through exhibitions, residencies, and the Lofoten International Art Festival.

Don Lawrence Arkitekt is an Oslo-based, award-winning architecture studio exploring the intersection of art, architecture, and place-making.

Dr. Hyungyu Park is an Associate Professor of Tourism at Middlesex University, UK, whose research explores heritage tourism’s role in identity, memory, and peacebuilding, and its potential to foster reconciliation, resilience, and sustainable cultural futures.

Sepatokimin Initiative empowers marginalised communities across Indonesia through creative economy development, combining participatory design, research, and training to build sustainable local livelihoods.

Stephanie Florence is an artist and curator whose practice explores interspecies citizenship and the commodification of living bodies under colonial-capitalist systems.

La Maraña is a woman-led non-profit in Puerto Rico that uses imagination and participatory design to empower communities in shaping equitable, sustainable futures.

Rudolf’s Gems is a socially responsible gemstone artisan company in Zambia working to build a more ethical gemstone industry through community partnerships, education, and advocacy.

Elise Hoebeke is a Belgian contemporary jewellery artist and lecturer at Sint Lucas Antwerp, whose practice explores the intersections of space, life, object, and jewellery.

Looking Ahead

Complementing its thematic focus, the Rethinking Tourism Network is an experiment in building structures of collaboration. Together, its members hope to identify networks, practices and relationships supporting care-based, regenerative approaches to tourism that presently operate beyond its existing structure. As the network develops, its priorities include sustainability, openness to new members, the creation of space for wider participation and shared ownership of its future directions.

Spotlight

Rethinking Nationhood through Tourism, Heritage and Ecology
Conference, 10–12 November 2025, Denpasar, Bali

How do tourism, heritage, and ecology contribute to the construction, contestation, and reimagination of national identity in a changing world?

The Rethinking Tourism Network and Warmadewa International Interdisciplinary Studies Programme (WIISP) held this conference in Denpasar, Bali, from 10–12 November 2025. The event brought together artists, academics, community organisers and practitioners to explore how tourism shapes, contests and reimagines nationhood in relation to cultural heritage and ecological transformation.

Event Details

🗓 Date: 10-12 November 2025

📍Location: Prama Sanur Beach, Bali, Indonesia

Subthemes

Tourism, Identity, and the Making of Nations

How tourism constructs and circulates national identity (historically and today) – in Bali and other contexts
Role of storytelling, heritage sites, discourse, and media in shaping national imaginaries (including cultural expressions such as art, architecture, language, festivals, and visual media as tools of national narrative-making)
Role of diaspora, migration, and transnational flows in shaping national identity through tourism (including intra-national dynamics relevant in the Indonesian context)
Decolonising Tourism and Reclaiming Heritage

Potential for tangible and intangible cultural heritage to reframe tourism narratives
Indigenous and community-led tourism and design practices (including architecture, performance, and material culture as living heritage and resistance)
Consent, representation, and cultural agency
From extractive tourism to reciprocal and care-based models grounded in community knowledge
The political mobilisation of heritage by local, national, and international forums (e.g. UNESCO, policy advocacy, or activist campaigns)
Ecological Nationhood: Multispecies and Regenerative Futures
Anti-colonial and ecofeminist approaches to tourism
Equitable access to clean air, water, land, and a safe climate
Nature as kin, habitat restoration, intergenerational and multispecies justice
Tourism’s potential in climate adaptation and ecological repair (Creative ecologies and environmental storytelling in tourism practices)
Place-based Imaginaries in Nation-Building

How tourism reshapes urban/rural dynamics and development
Craft, architecture, and spatial justice
Which places are protected, developed, displaced—or erased—in the name of national progress?
Policy, Governance, and Plural Sovereignties
Innovative governance of tourism and heritage
Legal systems and land rights
Equitable access to health, infrastructure, and safe living environments (Including community-driven design of infrastructure and services)
Nation-building in the context of decentralisation and globalisation
Human rights, equity and inclusion in nation-building
The impact of tourism policy on marginalised groups, including women, children, and Indigenous peoples
Participatory, community-led policy design that addresses diverse needs

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