Past events
Grief & Praise
Full-day workshop
May 21, 2023
Berlin, Fangschleuse
“Grief and love are sisters, woven together from the beginning. Their kinship reminds us that there is no love that does not contain loss and no loss that is not a reminder of the love we carry for what we once held close.”
— Francis Weller
Grief is a sister of love. And we love through praise, through the expression of devotion to that which we love.
All of us have experienced grief, for life introduces us to grief at the moment of our birth. Unknowingly, we grieve separation from the womb as newborns. Later in life, we grieve the separation from our homes, loved ones, health, places, periods in our lives, or futures that we imagined. In times of ecological collapse, the earth we once knew is changing rapidly, species and cultures are disappearing, and the stories we tell ourselves and live by no longer seem to make sense.
We learn to anticipate grief— because this state of being feels so deeply overwhelming, ceaseless, and unpredictable. Yet in this process, we calcify our hearts, and we create protective measures against pain. Only to resign ourselves from the full spectrum of feeling and the human experience. Coming together as a community and relearning to grieve and praise — supported by the living world, is the sacred work of being alive.
In this workshop, we invite you into an intimate, open, and transformative space where grief can be expressed through stories, communion, and praise. We will go out into the nature of Fangschleuse, just a 20-min train ride from Berlin Ostkreuz, and explore the landscapes of environmental decay as well as the beauty and repose. Additionally, we will sense into how diverse landscapes impact us emotionally, as well as, to borrow from Stephen Harrod Buhner, the climate of the mind that created these landscapes.
I.N.S.E.C.T
Summer camp
July 10-18, 2023
Hvalsø, Denmark
The I.N.S.E.C.T. Summercamp, now in its second year, brings together global designers, architects, artists, biologists, entomologists, ecologists, and like-minded researchers to improve methodologies around multispecies co-creation and design. We call ourselves the I.N.S.E.C.T. Collective, and we hope to make this annual event a critical locus for building and sharing new methodologies for a changing world.
We are particularly interested in interacting with and designing for insects and other, commonly-overlooked organisms. Last year we concentrated on prototyping a digitally-designed insect hotel in part 1. In part 2, we explored ways-of-being with insects through experimental methods such as meditation, perception walks, primal play, wearable props and more.
Poster design by Sympoiesis. We will participate and co-design the camp.