Špela Petric

It is often said that many of the forces shaping contemporary life unfold at scales beyond direct human perception and can only be (partially) grasped through technological interfaces or conceptual models. Climate systems, global logistics, and digital infrastructures are typical examples, exceeding individual experience while structuring everyday life. This intensive course explores artistic methods for approaching such out-of-human-scale processes through embodied experimentation. Its point of departure is the recognition that we are already in relation to these seemingly ungraspable phenomena: they penetrate our bodies and condition our existence. We are already intimate with them—without giving consent, and in ways that do not necessarily feel domestic, private, or even perceptible. The course is therefore an invitation, despite the apparent impossibility, to reclaim and reframe this awkward intimacy by devising artistic tools, protocols, and experiments that enable us to acknowledge and engage with it. We will begin with an exercise involving plants, whose different modes of existence can guide us through a first encounter with unfamiliar temporalities. From there we will move outward into the urban environment to examine the mundane systems and infrastructures that sustain us. Students will devise personal probes into these systems, asking what kinds of ethico-onto-epistemologies might emerge through their use. The week will combine a collective experiment, discussion, field observation, and hands-on prototyping, culminating in proposals/interventions that articulate new ways of sensing and relating to large-scale processes. Students who wish to participate are asked to submit a short motivation letter (max 1 page) outlining their interest in the topic and briefly describing their artistic or research practice. Please send the letters to studio@spelapetric.org by 13th of April. The class will be taught as a block course from 24 to 30 July 2026. The first session will take place at 16:00 on 24 July in room 2.11.100. As a short literary introduction to the topic, I can recommend 'The Second Body' by Daisy Hildyard. --- It is often said that many of the forces shaping contemporary life unfold at scales beyond direct human perception and can only be (partially) grasped through technological interfaces or conceptual models. Climate systems, global logistics, and digital infrastructures are typical examples, exceeding individual experience while structuring everyday life. This intensive course explores artistic methods for approaching such out-of-human-scale processes through embodied experimentation. Its point of departure is the recognition that we are already in relation to these seemingly ungraspable phenomena: they penetrate our bodies and condition our existence. We are already intimate with them—without giving consent, and in ways that do not necessarily feel domestic, private, or even perceptible. The course is therefore an invitation, despite the apparent impossibility, to reclaim and reframe this awkward intimacy by devising artistic tools, protocols, and experiments that enable us to acknowledge and engage with it. We will begin with an exercise involving plants, whose different modes of existence can guide us through a first encounter with unfamiliar temporalities. From there we will move outward into the urban environment to examine the mundane systems and infrastructures that sustain us. Students will devise personal probes into these systems, asking what kinds of ethico-onto-epistemologies might emerge through their use. The week will combine a collective experiment, discussion, field observation, and hands-on prototyping, culminating in proposals/interventions that articulate new ways of sensing and relating to large-scale processes. Students who wish to participate are asked to submit a short motivation letter (max 1 page) outlining their interest in the topic and briefly describing their artistic or research practice. Please send the letters to studio@spelapetric.org by 13th of April. The class will be taught as a block course from 24 to 30 July 2026. The first session will take place at 16:00 on 24 July in room 2.11.100. As a short literary introduction to the topic, I can recommend 'The Second Body' by Daisy Hildyard.