In this workshop, we will explore the idea that we do not only inhabit our own bodies. We are also part of a much larger “body” – one with which we are intimately connected, one we influence, and which in turn influences us, yet one that is often difficult to truly experience our connection to.
The leather shoes that I wear may, however indirectly, connect me to India through the hide of a cow that once lived there; to the life of a seamstress in Vietnam; and to a rubber plantation in Brazil.
By “following the materials,” we will speculatively trace how objects that hold personal meaning to us are composed of materials moving through cycles of production, circulation, use, and afterlife. How they shift between active and passive states within the global economy and across different realms of meaning. By considering “things” beyond the personal, often intimate importance we may ascribe to them, and imagining their full lifespans. We will try to invoke a sense of the many lives and places they have affected and will continue to affect after we part ways.
Register here
Apply through this link: .
Spots are limited.
Fika will be served.
About the artist
Birthe Jørgensen is an artist and chair of Konstfrämjandet Gotland. In 2026, she is artist鈥慽n鈥憆esidence at Tema Environmental Change and Tema Technology and Social Change at Linköping University, supported by the profile area Societal Transformations.
A former lecturer in environmental art at the Glasgow School of Art (2013–2019), Jørgensen is now based in the coastal village of Slite on Gotland, where she has initiated a new district for Konstfrämjandet. Her artistic practice explores how care, complexity and place鈥慴ased methods can enrich public conversations about Sweden’s green industrial transition.
Through her work, Jørgensen brings together artists, researchers and local communities to investigate how arts鈥慴ased approaches can support inclusive and just climate transition pathways.