Create the Future Yourself
Those who enter the Futurium step into an arena in which they can get involved and learn to do things themselves. During the Workshop Weeks from 30 May to 9 June 2018 this will mean: visitors can themselves build, discuss, cook in a climate-neutral manner, plant things, and even help shape the very fundamentals of the Futurium itself. There will be opportunities for everything, as well as professional guidance along the way.
For instance, if you’re interested in helping shape the Futurium you can take part in one of the three so-called Exhibit Workshops. During these workshops, we will, in a playful way and together with members of the public, directly develop prototypes and fundamentals for parts of the future exhibition. And those who wish to be well prepared for participating in one of the DER SPIEGEL Live Debates can engage in advance with the latter’s topics in one of the three Debate Workshops.
THE EXHIBIT WORKSHOPS
For example, you can write dialogues for robots and immediately try out the effectiveness of your lines with the help of professional puppeteers. This workshop is all about the “Robot Theatre”, which is envisaged as one of the exhibits in the part of the exhibition dealing with technology and our relationship to it. However, we will be turning the perspective around: it will be the robots talking about their everyday lives and giving their thoughts about us humans. What indeed would they have to gossip about over a beer after work?
Another theme of the exhibition is our relationship with nature. This Exhibit Workshop allows you to let your imagination run wild – and design artificial natural worlds of the future while you’re at it. What will nature look like in the future? How can we protect it and perhaps even provide new opportunities for it to spread – in cities, for example? Participants’ visions will be arranged in collages and used as the basis for a large-scale honeycomb diorama that will be seen later in the exhibition.
Our third Exhibit Workshop will deal with the relationship of us human beings with ourselves, and especially with our notion of time. What accelerates our everyday life? What causes stress? What leaves our heads unable to switch off? Are you unable to turn off that TV series or pull yourself away from that Twitter feed? Conversely, what helps us relax? Imaginatively designed alarm clocks will give visual form to the most important stress factors. They will also serve as prototypes for an exhibit.
THE DEBATE WORKSHOPS
Three Debate Workshops will give you the opportunity to deal intensively with the topics of an evening debate taking place on the same night (in cooperation with DER SPIEGEL live): civic involvement, digitisation and sustainability. Workshop participants will be empowered to take part in the discussion in a well-grounded and, above all, active manner. During a guided tour, and in discussions with members of our team, you will also gain special insights into our work at the Futurium. Following the workshops, all participants are more than welcome to attend the debates associated with the workshop. Seats will be reserved for you.
Debate Workshop 1: Shaping the Future – A Task for Us All
You will be dealing with current challenges and addressing trends in politics, technology and society. You will identify the issues that are of most crucial importance for yourself and develop a joint vision of civic involvement in the year 2040. Click here to register!
Debate Workshop 2: DigiTotal – Chances, Risks and Side Effects
You will be dealing with the future of the digital society. You will gather together the hopes, wishes and fears that you associate with automation, artificial intelligence and virtual worlds, and work out what digitisation means for our everyday lives. Click here to register!
Debate Workshop 3: What do we need to feel happy? An evening about sustainable living
You will be concerning yourself with the question of the relationship between individual and societal happiness. The topic will be approached on the basis of very personal moments of happiness: What are the prerequisites for happiness and what are the obstacles to it? And how can we make a person from our own personal environment (more) happy? Click here to register!
The following applies to all workshops: previous knowledge is not required; registration and participation are desired. For the Exhibit Workshops, participants must be at least 12 years old and, in the case of the debate workshops, at least 14.
Photo credit: Ali Ghandtschi