The focus of Learning from the Grassroots first documentary film is Land in Sicht, part of the Kleine Stadtfarm (Small City Farm) in Lobau, in Vienna’s 22nd district.
Located in the middle of the city and yet also in the Donau Auen National Park, the Kleine Stadtfarm is a landing place for civic engagement. It hosts a vibrant network of 20 associations as well as start-ups that create synergies and close cycles in a coordinating association. Associations from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds jointly cultivate the land leased by the City of Vienna.
What began as an experiment in self-sufficiency has, over the past ten years, developed into an urban agriculture project with an impact that extends beyond the 22nd district.
The socio-educational and ecological enterprise Land in Sicht shows how not only young plants, vegetables, and native meadow flowers grow here, but also community. There are educational programs for school classes, guided tours of the so-called Welttellerfeld (world plate field), cultural events, and workshops on ecological and political topics at the Salettl cultural association, as well as an old greenhouse with a lot of history and stories to tell.
The film also looks back on the eventful history of this special place: from an innovative ecological market garden in the 1960s and 70s, which was already a cultural hub back then, to today’s community project in the nowadays densely populated 22nd district. Learning from the Grassroots: Land in Sicht is a cinematic exploration of what connects the city, nature, and society.
The initial impetus for the documentary film project Learning from the Grassroots arose during the coronavirus lockdown. In a time marked by isolation, uncertainty, division and digital overload, I became acutely aware of how much our society craves genuine human interaction. Social media and conspiracy theories took over—while I longed for authenticity, a lived sense of community, and for meaningful togetherness.
This tension gave rise to a desire to explore forms of communal living and economic activity—specifically, community farming. What does it mean today to take responsibility for our own food, for the soil, and for one another? How can collective action succeed on a small scale—beyond ideology, and instead based on mutual respect, a willingness to experiment, and the desire to break new ground?
Learning from the Grassroots accompanies a community farming project in Vienna that not only asks precisely these questions, but also deals with them on a daily basis. For me, the film is an attempt to listen, learn, and reveal what often grows in secret: solidarity-based, self-organized structures that encourage greater social transformation.
In keeping with the grassroots idea, I tried to find a narrative structure for the first Learning from the Grassroots film that corresponded to the topic itself. Just as community and self-organization in a community farming project are not controlled “from above” but come to life through many voices, experiences, and perspectives, the film should also be a collective mosaic. An invitation to think, empathize, and perhaps even participate.
However, since the structure of the entire community farming project—of which Land in Sicht is only one part—is quite complex, I felt it was necessary to create a certain narrative framework. Grassroots initiator Nikolai Ritter, who not only launched Land in Sicht but was also previously co-founder of Kleine Stadtfarm and, before that, initiated the Garden of Encounter at the Traiskirchen refugee camp, seemed to me to be the right choice for this.
Although I generally prefer an open, process-oriented narrative style, in this case I deliberately opted for a central interview with him. It does not serve as a classic explanation or guide, but rather as an orientation aid—a subtle common thread that helps to better understand the diverse connections between the individual projects and people without detracting from their independence.
