Danick Trouwloon
2025

The Silvia de Groot Fund supports the publication and dissemination of a zine titled Synthesizing silences between wor(l)ds, which was co-produced during a 3-day art-science retreat by a diverse group of inspiring early career Caribbean research professionals. The zine reflects the questions asked during the retreat, exploring what separates and connects us in Caribbean research.

What does it mean to have our umbilical cords buried here, while the roots and routes that tie us to the Caribbean remain in flux? What does it mean to be native or introduced, invasive or exiled? And who gets to decide? It dreams of new research relationships within the Caribbean by imagining new roles for ourselves, for research, and for education. Moving from anxieties through salt scars to healing, it finds hope in a Caribbean of mangroves – belonging neither to the ocean nor the land – but to both. 
 
The retreat took place on Curaçao in the summer of 2025, and was co-organized with Alexine Gabriela, Janneke den Dekker-Arlain, and dr. Tatiana Acevedo Guerrero. The retreat was funded through the SEALINK project (project number NWOCA.2019.003) of the research program 'Caribbean Research: a Multidisciplinary Approach', which is financed by the Dutch Research Council (NWO).

Danick Trouwloon is a PhD candidate at Utrecht University with the SEALINK project, a zinester, and a community organizer. Born and raised on Curaçao, her research focuses on how science and art can contribute to sustainable development on Curaçao and in the wider Caribbean. She is a member of the 6 ISLANDS Zine and the Islands and Oceans Imaginaries Collectives and supports in Caribbean Knowledge Coordination at the Dutch Climate Research Initiative (KIN).