Learning from Nature
Learning from Nature: Rethinking Institutions in a More-Than-Human World
Led by Krisztián Gábor Török, Curator of MODEM - Centre for Modern and Contemporary Arts, Debrecen, Hungary.
📅 Friday, April 25, 2025
- 🕘8 am CEST, Budapest
- 🕘7 am BST, London
- 🕘11 am AST, Doha
- 🕘1.30 pm IST, Bengaluru
- 🕘4 pm AEST, Sydney
- 🕘3 pm JST, Tokyo
As cultural institutions increasingly engage with ecological themes, the question arises: Are cultural institutions truly learning from nature—or simply representing it? Imagine if museums, biennials, and cultural spaces moved beyond symbolic gestures toward deep, systemic transformation, drawing on nature not as metaphor but as methodology.
This CIMAM Connects session, proposed and led by Krisztián Gábor Török, explores how art institutions can evolve from static repositories into regenerative, adaptive ecosystems—living systems that mirror the complexity, fluidity, and resilience of the natural world. Inspired by artistic and curatorial practices grounded in ecological thinking, local and indigenous knowledge, and site-specific engagement, this conversation asks:
Beyond Representation → How can representation shift from an anthropocentric perspective ? How can institutions embody nature’s regenerative, self-organizing principles rather than simply depict them?
Beyond Institutional Borders → What can museums learn from ecosystems, multi-species relationships, and non-human governance models?
Beyond Human-Centric Learning → Can institutional structures adopt nature-inspired strategies such as mutualism, succession, or adaptive feedback?
Beyond the Museum as Archive → How can cultural spaces act as ecological agents rather than extractive keepers of heritage?
Bringing together artists, architects, curators, and cultural practitioners from diverse regions and disciplines, this session will unpack what it means for institutions to not just respond to environmental crises—but to transform with them. It challenges us to rethink how we organize, collaborate, and sustain ourselves, not just as human collectives, but as participants in a deeply interconnected planetary network.
If museums and cultural spaces are to remain relevant amid climate breakdown and ecological collapse, they must evolve—becoming spaces of reciprocity, care, and adaptation. How can we move from representation to integration, from display to embodied practice? Let’s think through these questions together.
Visit the Members Only dedicated section to find the link to register for the upcoming sessions.