An opportunity to become the citizen-commisioner of an artwork
Art Living Lab seeks to promote stable alliance/constituencies between actors of European territories to facilitate innovation ecosystems to get Nature-Based Artistic Solutions. Faced with complex sustainability challenges, only participatory and transversal responses can be given. Contemporary art is more than a work of art, there are also protocols, devices and soft methodologies that can be replicated in other places. In fact, few places are as disruptive as art. Art Living Lab activates participatory processes through the Living Lab experience, where artists should attend to citizen demands resulting from a mediation process.
The objective of this project is to promote transversal cultures of participatory that respond to environmental challenges and to demonstrate, from practice, how art and culture can intervene in sustainability. On the first edition of Art Living Lab, Art Living Lab for Sustainability, 2023 - 2025, we focused on natural commons working on land, water and clay, each one in a different territory. On the second edition, Art Living Lab to Repair the Land 2025 - 2026, we are focusing on the idea of repairing territories that have been damaged by economic activities which, once no longer profitable, were abandoned, leaving behind environmental and social consequences.
The urgency of the climate crisis forces us to experiment with new governance models and to generate relational spaces for co-working, collective listening and decision-making that help sustain the planet. Art Living Lab also seeks to increase the skills of the cultural sector in the generation of participatory spaces and, above all, to increase awareness of the know-how that communities and the cultural sector have in managing ecosystems. The resilience of the territories involves strengthening local communities and networks of mutual support, and art has a great impact there.
We started with the commons in 2023 and continued with wounded territories in 2025
Art Living Lab serves as an umbrella structure, uniting various projects under a shared methodology that focuses on themes critical to the conservation of our planet. Launched in 2023 with support from Creative Europe and local co-funding partners, the initiative has completed three artworks resulting from its first three living labs. Building on the lessons learned, we are now working on three additional projects as part of the next phase, continuing to explore sustainability through collaborative art and community engagement.
Art Living Lab for Sustainability (2023 - 2025)
In the first edition, we focused on territories that have a particular relationship with their natural commons: land, water, and clay. In Couso (Galicia, Spain), a community that self-manages their forest is concerned about the future of its way of life; in Jura (Jura region, France), a group of residents and experts is concerned about the paths of groundwater and the changes in its karst condition; and in Boom (Flanders, Belgium), its community wants to commemorate the importance of the clay industry while looking toward a more sustainable future.
Art Living Lab to Repair the Land (2025 - 2026)
On the second edition, we are focusing on the idea of repairing territories that have been damaged by economic activities which, once no longer profitable, were abandoned, leaving behind environmental and social consequences. We explore the consequences of the mine in Barruelo de Santullán (Palencia, Spain), and of industrial versus local agriculture in Wietstock (Ludwigsfelde, Germany), and energy-driven landscape transformation in Šibenik (Šibenik-Knin, Croatia).