Notes from Atopia

Unfolding over three days at Appleton Box, Alvalade, Notes from Atopia invites participants into solo and small group encounters that aim to dissect, explore and dialogue with the particularities of the pre-, during and post-COVID19 world. The project was also accompanied by a digital experience for international participants. Inspired by the term ‘Atopia’ – to mean placelessness, or a society without borders and no national identity – Notes from Atopia queries the altered landscape of awareness that emerged in the aftermath of COVID-19 when many populations across the world were united in a suspended digital terrain of self-isolation.

Notes from Atopia was commissioned by the 4Cs Project: From Conflict to Conviviality through Creativity and Culture, supported by the European Cooperation Project and funded by Creative Europe under the direction of Dr. Luisa Santos.

Research Process

Participants were asked to bring in a personal object, image, text, or memory that holds significance in relation to their experience of the COVID19 phenomena. Using a set of procedures grounded in the Form of Inquiry (FOI) method as developed by the Melbourne Institute of Experiential and Creative Art Therapy (MIECAT), Nithya Iyer guided participants through a series of experiential and responsive interactions that aim to engage alternative modes of sense-making. The resulting insights were digitally archived (with the permission of the participant) and act as a global cultural resource that articulates insights from this particular period in time.

Research was undertaken in cyclical three-hour sessions of solo and group facilitation, running to 23 participants over three days.