It all started back in 2006 with a dreamer, our very own director Leon van Rooij, and his dire wish to create a space where creatives could share their works and their processes in order to inspire fellow artists. A community of forward thinkers, boundaries-pushers and artistic explorers unafraid to imagine everything in the fields of digital arts, film, animation and games. A playground with creativity as currency.
Flash-forward to today. Playgrounds has become a widely recognised innovator and connector between makers, industry, education and audience, providing a stable fundament to boost new and relevant developments. From sold-out events in various cities and countries all the way to a nationally recognised talent hub and development program, our activity has spread and diversified under the motto “moving forward, creating together”.
And since we don’t turn 20 every year, we’d like to take a moment and properly celebrate all that Playgrounds has grown into in the last two decades. So prepare yourself for a special year with various ways of marking and celebrating this very special and important milestone. Check out some of the things that will be happening….
A fab celebration requires also a good setting where we can all get together, take trips down memory lanes and are able to see how far we have come together. We think The Art Department Eindhoven, our biggest event but also the one based in our home-town, provides us with the perfect spot for rounding up our community.
Tad berlin
Since we want to channel our efforts towards one big party with everyone, this year The Art Department Berlin will no longer take place. We know: sad news for our Berlin and East European communities. We are doing our best to ease their extra expenses (our Discord channel holds the details for this) but we promise: joining us in Eindhoven will be totally worth it!
Extra Festival day
By popular demand, we are adding to the usual TAD program an extra day: 15 April – filled with in-depth talks and masterclasses! Aimed at professionals that want to take a deeper dive into the specifics of the creative process of various artists, the In-Depth Day | A full day of extensive talks and masterclasses is bound to enhance your TAD experience!
Tickets are already up for grabs and they will give you access to the entire program of that day!
Open call | artist talk
For our 20th Anniversary, we are also giving our community the chance to become speakers on one of our stages. Fill out this form so that we’ll get to know you and your work a bit better. If it sparks our interest, we’ll give you the chance to be in the spotlight during The Art Department Eindhoven 2026.
The deadline for this open call is 9 February at 17:00 CET.
We will get back to you shortly after the deadline, whether you are selected or not.
open call | Art Market
And that’s not all. For the second year in a row, we are giving everybody a chance to apply for one of the available booths at the Art Market taking place during The Art Department 2026. Our curators will select the crème de la crème ensuring our art market has variety and innovation!
Fill out this form with your details. Keep in mind that signing up doesn’t automatically mean you’ve secured a spot.
Deadline to register and submit the form: 9 February 2026 – 17:00h! We’ll inform all selected applicants before the 16th of February.
Referral program
The referral program is also making a come-back this year, so once you’ve secured your ticket, generate your link and invite your friends and community to use it when purchasing theirs. There are discounts and prizes to be won!
Next gen tickets
Speaking of discounts, did you notice that our Next Gen tickets provide reduced prices to anybody aged 25 or under? Being enrolled in an educational institution is no longer a requirement. We wanted to ensure our festival is encouraging young people that are not affiliated to a school to also join us!
Of course, if you do want to join us with your school, you can reach out to us!
As ever, if you have additional questions you can always address them via Discord!
To wrap things up, we’ll just name drop some additional program elements, promising to provide more details when the time is right: 20 years retrospective, workshops, artist studios, free access program, larger outside area expo, groovy dancing after-party!