LUNÄ TALK at ENACT

Organised by LUCA’s Arts & Society expertise network, ENACT Festival presents innovative forms of transmission of research methodologies. Together, we will explore the exposition of artistic research as itself an epistemic practice. Known for developing innovative methodologies, artistic researchers also develop creative ways to perform their research.

ENACT invites audiences to engage with the diverse worlds, methodologies and forms of expression of artistic enquiry. In a week of participative performances, sonic transmissions and open discussions, LUCA researchers and their collaborators explore fields as various as silt intelligence and Inquisitorial testimonies, live-stream forest ecologies and reworkings of folk traditions, and the means through which this research communicated. Join us for a week of participatory performances, open conversations, and unexpected encounters. ENACT is not just a festival, it’s a transmission of ideas between and via artistic research(ers).

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LUNÄ (Marjolijn Dijkman, 2011 – ongoing) is an art installation and conversation piece that references the legacy of the 18th-century Lunar Society of Birmingham—a group of enthusiasts and lay scholars who met on full moon nights to discover and discuss new ideas. The ‘Lunatics,’ as they were called, transformed science and changed the world. They built theories, engines, and invented machines and ideas. They altered the face of their time. Three centuries later, LUNÄ revisits this moment of historical significance. A facsimile of the original table where Lunar Men met provides a critical context for speculating and expanding on topics the original society possibly discussed, as well as exploring new ideas within these fields. Each conversation, in sync with the full moon, will feature a high tide of ideas, concepts, and questions, instigating concordances between what is current and exciting in science, philosophy, and the social imagination.

The LUNÄ Talk on November 5th, on full moon, will focus on the effects of Enlightenment thinking, the Industrial Revolution, and colonization on water bodies, as well as the various material and immaterial traces of these influences in the water and sediment. It will also take a critical look at water ‘management’ and the paradigm shifts needed to restore water bodies and our relationship with the more-than-human world.

Confirmed contributors:
– Merve Bedir (Architect, co-founder of Aformal Academy (an experimental school program in Pearl River Delta region), a founding member of Mutfak مطبخ Workshop, and a founding member of Center for Spatial Justice in Istanbul. Merve examines infrastructures of hospitality and mobility, and researches human and nonhuman relationships in the context of ecology and cybernetics.
– Marjolijn Dijkman (artist and PhD researcher LUCA/KU Leuven, working on art in precarious and complex historical contexts involving intergenerational care and ecological restoration)
– Ifor Duncan (writer, artist, postdoctoral researcher at ‘EcoViolence’ at the University of Utrecht, whose work concerns political violence produced through watery ecosystems)
– Shivant Jhagroe (researcher, writer, musician, University Leiden; examines ‘eco-belonging’ in Global North regions through a decolonial lens, focusing on lived experiences, cultural narratives, and political agency)
– Annelies Kuypers (post-human anthropologist, ULB, Brussels; researching the long-term consequences of the 2021 floods in Belgium and Germany from the perspective of river mud)

More information soon.