About Pedagogy Of Space

Our history

This project began as a research into common interests and gathering of experiences. Among these are central: Questions on rights and inclusion to land and the city, gentrification, facilitation methods, pedagogical approaches, play, activist strategies, de-colonial critique, mapping, methods of crafting and making as well as ways of collaboration and collectivity. Since the project has developed – and is still developing – in the direction of forming an open system of practical methodologies. Our interest in context and struggles have brought us to work and study in many different places internationally. Over time, this has formed a diverse set of experiences and a broad network with a critical focus on post-colonial structures especially in Latin America and Europe.

We have both experience working with and studying Theatre of the Oppressed as well as the Permaculture Design System.

What we do

From the very beginning we have worked in collaborations on projects and as facilitators in teaching and workshop formats. There has always been a focus on process, on what happens in the room at the moment, more than making a finished product. In relation to design, we have practised methods of intervention, adding details to a space as a way of starting more long term collaborations and critical discourses. Here we specifically have worked with crafting and making together, looked into materials and shapes on a very practical level.

Another important part of our practice is observation and listening through a careful attention to details in spaces. We like to look at how spaces are used, how the built and planned environments are appropriated by people of everyday life – establishing a basis for changes to happen or to get closer into the identities and issues of a place.

Outcomes: What we like is when a conversation automatically generates energy to do unexpected things or things previously thought impossible. We hope our processes and projects can have that effect within the given contexts. Our outcomes are not always visible. They are, basically, what takes place after we leave. We aim to that the time we spend together in a given context can crystallise into a concrete action whether on a physical, designing level or purely organisational and social.

Why we do it

We look at landscapes as ecosystems closely intertwined with social layers. A landscape is not something to merely look at; The notion of nature can never be disconnected from the idea of social space – not under the current climate crisis and global hegemonic extraction politics.

The intensification of oppressive techniques that has been developed through colonisation is now also to be found in use in the so-called West. Therefore, whether we work in the Chilean country-side or in a large city in Scandinavia, it is important to us to maintain focus on and develop tools to counter oppressive power dynamics. These dynamics are often performed in space, through development or distribution of spaces, and it is here they can be challenged. We strongly feel that if the field of fine art should ever matter, it needs first to acknowledge its own role within the colonial, capitalist history. Thereafter, it needs to work actively in developing and practising de-colonial critical engagement through common learning and organising.