About TBA21–Academy

TBA21–Academy is TBA21’s research and advocacy arm, fostering deeper relationships with the Earth’s hydrosphere and its extended ecologies through the lens of art to activate new forms of care and collective action. Operating as an incubator for collaborative inquiry, research-based artistic production, and environmental advocacy, the Academy works through exhibitions, commissions, fieldwork, residencies, pedagogical programs, and assemblies, and catalyzes new forms of knowledge emerging from exchanges between art, science, policy, and civic engagement.

TBA21–Academy operates through three interconnected laboratories: Ocean Space in Venice, the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid, and Convivial LAB in Jamaica. Together, they function as situated field stations where art, research, and activism are grounded in specific territories and aquatic ecologies, developed in close collaboration with local communities while thinking at a planetary scale.

Over the last years, TBA21–Academy has increasingly taken on the role of an advocacy actor: engaging with international forums, supporting experimental governance practices, and working with partners to articulate new legal, cultural, and political frameworks for more just ocean futures. 

TBA21—Academy team

Director TBA21–Academy: Eduardo Castillo Vinuesa

Project Manager Lead: Elisa Cuesta, Benedetta d'Ettorre, Maria Buey 

Project Manager: Jon Aranguren Juaristi, Louise Carver

Project Coordinator: Lucas Orozco

Digital Program Director: Petra Linhartová

Digital Program Manager: Aleksandra Czerniak, Michal Kučerák

Researcher for MEDiverSEAty: Ludovica Montecchio