The Netherlands

Aurovilians Ivar Jenten and Brigitte Vink, both originally from the Netherlands, have been working with village children for many years. In June 2021 they founded Isai Ragam under Auroville’s Auromitra Trust.

Daniel Helman Lee grew up in Auroville, graduated from Future School in 2019 and studied in Maastricht, The Netherlands, before moving to Israel, where she is now enrolled in a Master of Fine Arts creative writing programme in Tel Aviv.

In a recent issue of News & Notes, a twelve-week course on kolams was announced. It would help people, it said, to “find their compass, reorientate and be able to prioritise direction, regulate boundaries and thresholds within themselves and the surrounding world”.

In October 2024 we interviewed Dan Capdeville who launched the “Seeking Our Inner Being” project in January of that year. Now, one and a half years later, he has decided to formally close it down.

Conductor and composer Eugeen Liven d’Abelardo passed away in Laren, the Netherlands on 18 August at the age of 75. Along with his impressive musical career, he was also known to be an enjoyer of life.

Aurodeva is an artist and art therapist born and raised in Auroville whose work displays a rich blend of creativity, introspection, and connection to his roots.

The first thing that strikes you about any exhibition of Priya Sundaravalli’s is the sheer fecundity and variety of her work which makes it impossible to classify her.

Yuval (Govert Jan van den Eijk) left his body on August 25 at the age of 77, at the Mahalakshmi Home for the elderly, surrounded by members of his family.

On April 2nd, Dutch Aurovilian Anna Oijevaar passed away. She was a lively, energetic and much appreciated Aurovilian, who came here first in 1988 and was registered as Aurovilian in 1993.

During the afternoon of May 17, long-term Dutch Aurovilian Nolly Senden passed away at the JIPMER hospital due to a stroke. She was 85. Nolly was temporarily residing at the Mahalakshmi Home to recover from a leg injury when she became unwell and started experiencing COVID symptoms.

The Auroville film EVER SLOW GREEN has been officially selected by six international film festivals and is nominated for two awards. The Green Screen Wildlife Film Festival, Eckernförde, Germany, the largest wildlife film festival in Europe, has nominated it for Best Newcomer FIlm.

On June 2nd, Jan Pieter passed away in the Netherlands after a period of illness. Jan Pieter's connection with Sri Aurobindo, the Mother and Auroville goes back to the mid-seventies.

There was a presentation on Universal Basic Income and the Sustainable Development Goals by Hilde Latour, a Basic Income activist from the Netherlands.

On 14 August our long-term Dutch friend and brother Pieter van der Molen (‘Big Piet’) passed away at the age of 75 in his home in Holland. Pieter, who in the sixties was the top judo trainee of the then world champion judo Anton Geesink, had during a judo demonstration session a profound inner experience which left him in shock and in search for answers.

Marcauro, the son of Lisa and Volker and the brother of Grace, Aurora and Karuna, passed away on April 29th. He had been given the name Marcauro by the Mother and had been living in The Netherlands.

In conversation, the brothers are a force of high energy and passion for their craft. They finish each other’s sentences, spark each other into tangents and backstories, and articulate each other’s feelings.

Peter Klingspies, a young Aurovilian who returned to Auroville in 2012 and works in Sumark Construction, shares his thoughts on his life and what it means to work in construction in Auroville.

Auroville International The Netherlands reported that its Facebook page is frequently visited, particularly its Trend Watching posting, which contains a report by two Dutch students of the Fontys Academy for Creative Industries (‘International Lifestyle Studies’) who are doing a research project in Auroville.

I was born in Auroville, but at the age of 14 I chose to go study at the Kodaikanal International School. I had always wanted to get out. I was always told that Auroville is a special place, and my parents were both here for that reason; but when you grow up it is not so evident why Auroville is special.

Auroville’s Hall of Peace, the home of the Peace Table for Asia, was inaugurated on February 11th, 2014.

Anusuya is a greenbelt community that was started at the end of the 1970’s. It was a difficult place to settle; people came and people went.