Zomerlab Talk: The entanglement of past, future and present

The Shock Forest Group is an international, multidisciplinary collective of musicians, designers, linguists, coders, artists and ecologists. They took their name from the forest that lies next to Het Hem, a former munition factory turned into a museum for contemporary art. The forest, called ‘Plofbos’ or ‘Schokbos’ in Dutch, ‘was specifically designed in order to withstand blasts and ammunition tests. For half a century, it both insulated the sound of explosive tests and hid the military activity from view’ (Nicolás Jaar on Shock Forest Group).

Guided by examples of their work as members of the Shock Forest Group, Jelger Kroese and Daria Kiseleva will share different perceptions of — and relationships with — time, that they encounter in their collective practice. They will invite you to reflect on the role and relevance of time in your own practice and explore with them the challenges and questions that we all work with, about the relation between past, future and present.

How do different temporalities manifest themselves in the present moment? How to engage with material and ghostly traces of the past? How to cultivate a collective sense of trust and safety, enabling us to be truly present and let go of certainty and expectations? How to oppose monocultural production, while working within contexts that are shaped by capitalist forces?