Open call: second cohort of the Aral School

The Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation (ACDF), chaired by Gayane Umerova, has launched the open call for the second cohort of the Aral School, an interdisciplinary postgraduate programme based in Nukus, Karakalpakstan, Uzbekistan, which studies and responds to the ecological changes within the Aral Sea region. Alongside this, Joseph Grima has been announced as the Programme Director for the second cohort, which will run from January to June 2027, around the themes of Climate and Landscape.

Following the pilot programme in 2026, the Aral School continues to bring together international and local participants from Uzbekistan and Karakalpakstan to explore solutions for social, cultural and ecological regeneration. Drawing on the region’s traditions, knowledge systems and biocultural context, the School fosters new ways of learning and working across disciplines.

Gayane Umerova, Chairperson of ACDF, said: "As a multidisciplinary investigative project, the Aral School is committed to meticulous research and to production as a regenerative practice. Through education and knowledge transition, we weave ties between the local landscape, culture and heritage, allowing new stories of our relationship with the world to materialise in tangible forms that inspire collective action and a more sustainable future for the Aral Sea basin and the planet as a whole."

Under Grima’s direction, the second cohort takes up climate and landscape as a structural question: what territory produces the region’s food and water, and what territory do they in turn produce. Soil, hydrology, wind, salt, the infrastructure of irrigation, the history of agricultural development and the cultural landscape become indicators of a single interconnected system.

Joseph Grima, Programme Director of the Aral School, said: “The Aral School is closer to a task force than to a traditional school or residency of the conventional kind. The learning takes place outside the classroom and within the environment. It is built on regional knowledge and on the institutions already working here. That is why it is worth treating as a new paradigm for what a design and ecology school can be.”

Grima arrived in Nukus in advance of the announcement, visiting the International Innovation Centre for the Aral Sea Basin, the Amu Darya, the river that once fed the Aral Sea, Park Istiqlol and the Mizdakhan necropolis with scientists, architects and historians from the region, and toured the Academy of Sciences of Karakalpakstan. At the School, the emphasis was on knowledge transfer into the next programme: reviewing the projects on water and food and the questions they leave open, set out by alumni and mentors of the first cohort.

The announcement followed the Aral Assembly at the State Museum of Arts of the Republic of Karakalpakstan named after Igor Savitsky, in Nukus, which celebrates its sixtieth anniversary this year.

The Aral Assembly, a three-day knowledge transfer programme, brought together alumni and mentors of the first cohort with the team leading the second, as well as international and local experts and practitioners. The event featured keynotes from Kristina Toderich (biosaline agriculture expert), Bobir Klichev (director of Arc Architects) and Joseph Grima (Aral School programme director), alongside panel discussions on communities, landscape and water and future practices, city walks led by Aral School alumni, community gatherings, film screenings and live performances. 

The open call is addressed to postgraduate practitioners worldwide, along with designers, architects, ecologists, engineers, scientists and researchers. Successful applicants will undertake a six-month residency in Nukus from January to June 2027. The open call closes on October 25, 2026.