ROUND TABLES – WITHOUT RESERVE 2024

Round-table: Trance-forming

Engaging in self-transformation would undoubtedly be the first step towards better or less transforming the world. How, by experimenting with artistic practices of somatic, psychological, sensory and spiritual reconnection, are the artists and thinkers of the 21st century inventing a new art of trance likely to guide us towards a world of many worlds?

With Fabrice Cazenave, Lélia Demoisy, Marina Pirot and Dominique Leroy (collective (n)), artists nominated for the Coal 2024 Prize, in dialogue with Jean Louis Tornatore, anthropologist and author of “Pas de transition sans tre : essai d’écologie politique des savoirs”, Éditions Dehors, 2023.

Moderator: Anne Lise Carlo, journalist.

Round-table: Living in birds: towards a relational ecology

In a world where the balance and conditions of animal life – whether wild or domesticated – have radically changed and deteriorated, how can ethology help us to re-establish peaceful, empathetic relationships with other species? Through the story of artistic experiences, this meeting explores how art can amplify our collective sensitivity and our relational imagination towards other animal species, to draw paths towards a peaceful, ethical and respectful coexistence of all beings.

With Nuno da Luz, Sacha Rey and Antoine Behaghel, nominated artists and winner of the COAL Student Prize, and Lisa Garnier, author of “Psychologie positive et écologie, Enquête sur notre relation émotionnelle à la nature”, éd. Actes Sud, 2019.

Moderator: Thomas Delage, Head of the Mobilizing Citizens for Biodiversity Department at the French Office for Biodiversity.

Round-table discussion: Contemporary myths and rituals: reconfiguring our relationship with life

“The sacred is not that big thing to bow down to, but what determines our values, what we’re willing to defend” wrote activist writer and American witch Starhawk. “We are nature defending itself” echoed activists and citizens in their protests for threatened ecosystems. If anthropology has demonstrated the existence of myths and rites in all human societies to interact with cycles and living beings, how can artists contribute to elaborating new sacralities, new narratives, techniques and rituals capable of engaging a transformative mobilization in favor of the Earth and the Living?

With Yan Tomaszewski, C.∆.R (Cellule d’Action Rituelle)(Isa Frémeaux, Jay Jordan, Nathalie Gélard and Thibaud Guichard), winners of the Prix COAL and the jury’s special prize, and Perig Pitrou, anthropologist, director of the Anthropologie de la vie laboratory at Collège de France.

Moderator: Christopher Yggdre, independent curator.

Round-table: Transformative Territories: creating spaces for fertile political imagination in territories

At a time when public authorities are clearly struggling to combat climate upheaval and the collapse of biodiversity, artists are proposing unprecedented spaces of freedom and possibility, contributing to the dynamics of ecological and political transformation of territories. Through their initiatives in the field, their exploratory, collective and participatory approaches, they are reinventing forms of administration of nature, and proposing other ways of inhabiting the Earth.

With Pascal Ferren, MITR Collective and Carla Gueye, nominated artists and winners of the Prix COAL mentions Centre Wallonie Bruxelles/ Paris and Ateliers Médicis.

Moderator: Patrick Degeorges, Philosopher, Member of the Institut Michel Serres (ENS Lyon), Vice-President of IHEPAT.