Creating The Future
A series of workshops combining arts and crafts with science and ecology to help us imagine positive futures.
Finsbury Park, Commons/Jamboree Hut, next to the Seven Sisters Gate (inside the park).
Starting on Sunday 20th October these workshops take place on the third Sunday of every month
(with an additional session on Wednesday 23rd October). More information on how to book is on Eventbrite.
These workshops aim to build an informal community in the heart of Finsbury Park, that come together to learn about resilience in response to some of our questions, confusions, concerns and desires for the future. We will be working together to tell meaningful and positive stories that help us imagine the future we need and how we might get there. Focusing on planetary and personal health, climate and environmental change, these workshops will combine art, craft making, storytelling and scientific data to slow down debate and find more gentle and positive ways of thinking, creating and collaborating.
The Commons/Jamboree Hut is wheelchair accessible, the workshops are designed to be inclusive, cross generational and with accessibility in mind. Please contact Rachel for more information and any questions about accessibility or taking part.
Creating the Future – Climate Change Maps
Sunday 20th October 2024
2.00-5.00pm
Book your ticket on Eventbrite
A making session that invites participants to create “climate change maps” together – circular symbols made from felt, glue, needles, thread, cardboard, paper, and wood to represent the impact of climate change on our lives. We’ll make, reflect, discuss and respond to one another and to questions posed and scientific data prepared by the facilitator. Working as a group, we will question and explore the different perspectives we hold about climate change and the future.
For more information about previous climate change emblem workshops visit: https://bookleteer.com/publication.html?id=3481
Creating the Future – Researching the Future
Wednesday 23th October 2024
5.30-8.30pm
This workshop is FREE to all participants, book your ticket on Eventbrite
Every year, as the autumn leaves fall in November in Finsbury Park, a mysterious artwork – Future Machine – appears alongside a musical celebration of the autumn and the weather. This workshop will involve an introduction to the Future Machine & When the Future Comes Project and an opportunity to work with UCL researcher Theano Moussouri and artist/researcher Rachel Jacobs to think of the questions that we need to ask – when the future comes. Using participatory research methods, together we’ll create a set of questions and themes to contribute to a long term study of what happens to the Future Machine over the next 27 years. We’ll ask what changes might occur for the people, places and ecologies involved in the project.
This is an opportunity to learn how academic research is planned and conducted, build your own research skills, become a ‘Guardian of the Future Machine’ and become an ongoing participant in the Future Machine project.
Creating the Future – Building a Future Machine
Sunday 17th November 2024
2.00-5.00pm
This workshop is FREE to all participants, book your ticket on Eventbrite
Every year, as the autumn leaves fall in November in Finsbury Park, a mysterious artwork – Future Machine – appears alongside a musical celebration of the autumn and the weather. The Future Machine was originally designed through workshops that took place across the country, including in Finsbury Park. This month, after Future Machine’s 5th appearance in the park on Saturday 9th November, the creating the future workshop will provide an opportunity for participants to design their own Future Machines, considering what we might need when the future comes.
For more information about previous building a Future Machine workshops visit: www.whenthefuturecomes.net/making-a-future-machine/.
Creating the Future – A Journey to the Future
Sunday 15th Deember 2024
2.00-5.00pm
Book your ticket on Eventbrite
Exploring storytelling, myth and folk tales, alongside scientific data, this workshop will explore how we can create alternative narratives about where we come from, where we are going and where we might return to. Looking at linear, cyclical and co-created ways of thinking about uncertainty, change and time passing. We will work co-operatively to create a series of beautifully crafted flip books, telling stories of the past, present and future. This workshop will draw on our own histories, places we have called home, the cultures, climates, languages and food that have rooted us or displaced us, as well as our favourite stories, songs and myths.
Creating the Future – Gifting Across Generations
Sunday 19th January 2025
2.00-5.00pm
Co-facilitated with writer Rose Levinson, we’ll take a cross-generational look at speculative futures, world building and climate modelling. What does it mean when we are told sea levels and global temperatures are expected to rise to dangerous levels in 30-100 years time? How does it affect us differently when we’re 15, 55 or 85 years old? We will look at scientific predictions and narratives and then write our own scenarios and wishes for the future. We will engrave our responses onto clay tablets and decide who to gift them to. This workshop is based on Rachel’s previous work with The Prediction Machine and Rose’s work with the webzine Emerging Voices.
Cost
The suggested ticket cost is £10 a session OR donate as you can. Some sessions are FREE (supported by the Arts Council of England and the Future Machine project). Food and refreshments will be provided at each session.
Background
Rachel Jacobs is running this series of monthly public workshops as part of The Commons Residency Project in Finsbury Park. The workshops draw on Rachel’s previous work creating the ambitious 30 year national project ‘Future Machine & When the Future Comes’; ‘Performing the Future’ that explored how we might think positively about the future in response to climate and environmental change; and the workshop series ‘The Republic of Learning’ – part of “Materialising Data, Embodying Climate Change” a collaboration with Giles Lane, Central Saint Martins University of the Arts London, Proboscis, Birkbeck University of London and NERC British Antarctic Survey.
For more information about the artist/facilitator Rachel Jacobs visit: www.i-am-ai.net/about
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Co-Facilitators
Rose Levinson, Ph.D., is Founder and Managing Editor of Emerging Voices The online publication is committed to presenting the work of creatives from under represented countries like Gaza, Kenya, Nigeria and Ukraine. In addition, it offers an audio series Conversations with Old(er) Women along with Rose’s essays. Prior to moving to London nine years ago, she was an adjunct professor at the University of San Francisco.