“The prevailing conditions of contemporary financialised neo-liberalism have limited our collective navigation towards a future. What was once the assumed function of the avant-garde modernist artist has been lost, forgotten or occluded in the ferment of recent theorisaton. This important task of thinking a future needs new forms to orient away from recent practical and theoretical cul-de-sacs. Conceived as an exhibition examining these logics of orientation, Who Thinks the Future? utilises the methodological tool of synthetic thinking, as developed by Peer Sessions, to combine multiple ideas into complex wholes.

Produced from a series of workshops, discussions and group readings, this exhibition proposes a discursive, collective practice that maintains complexity rather than flattening it in consensus, as a tool to produce common futures that can imagine forward again. This practice could be adopted to connect and represent positions across a spectrum, enabling an ecology of ideas to be engendered and enacted, and to rethink the role of the artist in social transformation." Tom Trevatt

Who thinks the future? is a Peer Sessions project, curated by Tom Trevatt, supported by Arts Council England, and part of ArtLicks Weekend 2014.

For Who Thinks the Future? Peer Sessions’ moderated group discussion format has been applied to a series of workshops with the participating artists. Artists were provided with a reading list, and encouraged to discuss a specific set of ideas, exploring the role art can play in shaping the future. The production of collective or synthetic knowledge during these encounters has informed the creation of work for the exhibition.

Peer Sessions is an educational support network for postgraduate artists, offering peer critique and collaborative opportunities, run by artists Kate Pickering and Charlotte Warne Thomas.

Talking About Contemporary Art

Free public workshops @ Lewisham ArtHouse
Friday 3rd October 3-4.30 pm
Saturday 4th October 4-5.30 pm
Sunday 5th October 4-5.30 pm

During the exhibition, Peer Sessions will host free Talking About Contemporary Art public workshops, open to those who are interested in increasing their confidence in engaging with, analysing and discussing contemporary art. These 1.5 hour long sessions will be facilitated by artists/ teachers Kate Pickering and Charlotte Warne Thomas, using the established and supportive Peer Sessions discussion format. No previous experience is necessary, non-artists are welcome.