The project Evolving Futures: Owning our Mess was an initiative of the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research (KLI) and the think-tank artEC/Oindustry. It emerged from a dissatisfaction towards mainstream approaches used to foster behavioural and cultural change both in research and policy. Evolving Futures created a new space for transformative and regenerative collaboration between artists, scientists, philosophers and sociologists. Our team came together to explore new ways of generating intrinsic motivation for pro-environmental behaviour and empowering individuals and groups to deal with the messy and wicked realities of climate change. Our final goal was the co-creation of two potentially transformative, participatory interventions that were performed on-live on May 11, 20211, the HOMONEXUS and the GLACIER NEX US (check out Outputs for our videos).

The questions that drove Evolving Futures: Owning our Mess was: How can we as individuals and society step away from fear and take responsibility for our mess? How can we develop intrinsic motivation and agency to address challenges related to climate change? How can artists and scientists work together towards the shared goal of supporting regenerative futures in times of climate emergency? We addressed these questions through creative and open-ended mutual learning and co-creation processes. We interwoven theories and practices from many scientific and artistic fields. We made use of theories of intrinsic motivation and embodied cognition. We mobilized complexity theories and nexus approaches. We experimented with participatory artistic installations and performances that explored new ways of exploring the relationships that tie our lives to a warming climate. We used embodied experiences to shape and reflect upon our hybrid-cyborg lives. We intersect the digital and the analogue, the virtual and the real, our bodies and our laptop screens, textiles and QR codes.

Funding grant: StartClim2020

Team:
Dominika Goglowski (History of Art)
Guido Caniglia (Sustainability Sciences)
Luana Poliseli (Philosophy of Science)
Alejandro Vilanueva (Ethnomusicology)
Lindsey Nicholson (Glaciologist)
Francesa Adelgani (Artist)
Ida-Marie Corel (Artist)

More: https://climartlab.space