Creative Resilience Lab: Creative methodologies for preparedness, adaptation and transformation in the climate future
‘Everything change’ is here. UN Nations Secretary General António Guterres described the latest IPCC report (28 Feb. 2022) as an ‘atlas of human suffering and a damning indictment of failed climate leadership’ as climate change impacts unfold rapidly across the globe after decades of dire warning by our science community. Remarkably, it didn’t make front page news across Australia. We need new stories and methodologies to prepare and adapt as the complexity of risks and hazards and our increasing dependence on urban systems is resulting in greater vulnerability of places and people. We are living in uncertain and speculative times. It is starkly apparent that the challenges climate change poses are far more severe and complex than anticipated, with existing systems and ways of thinking poorly equipped to manage. Without the luxury of time, there is an urgency in finding new ways to collaborate, experiment, plan and shift the paradigm of climate emergency engagement and disaster resilience.
In order for the public to fully absorb climate realities and compounding disasters, we need to tailor our approaches so that information is “actively communicated with appropriate language, metaphor, and analogy; combined with narrative storytelling; made vivid through visual imagery and experiential scenarios; balanced with scientific information, and delivered through trusted messengers in group settings”.
What you will learn:
This professional development opportunity for disaster resilience practitioners presents the methodology, and thinking behind the Creative Resilience Lab process piloted with 70 people in Vancouver, British Columbia in 2019 (prior COVID-19).
It is what we have missed over the past two years given the online environment – process - practice and connection. The two day Vancouver Creative Resilience Lab was successful in engaging and activating the public imagination on disaster preparedness leveraging the work of 100 Resilient Cities (specifically Vancouver and Melbourne). The creative practice builds upon Melbourne’s Arts House’s 5-year transdisciplinary project REFUGE in Melbourne where artists, Traditional Owners, emergency services, academics, government and communities explored, imagined and rehearsed climate-related disaster scenarios and considered how we might thrive and survive into uncertain and possible futures.
This event provides the opportunity to hear about and then practice this methodology with workshop participants to take back to your projects, communities and lives.
What we will explore:
How might working with artists and other creative practitioners reimagine disaster preparedness, response and recovery? How can we apply creative scenario planning to better understand plausible futures and as a result pathways to be better prepared? In what ways can we foster transdisciplinary and intersectional pathways for sustained collaboration and community engagement? How might we prioritise intergenerational justice in our disaster preparedness, response and recovery?
Who should attend?
AFAC and ADRC conference delegates plus participants from all walks of life and representatives including and beyond the emergency management sector are equally welcome. Attendees may include disaster resilience practitioners, artists, elders, community members, educators, government and industry representatives.
Presenters:
- Maree Grenfell, The Centre for Reworlding
- Dr Jen Rae, The Centre for Reworlding
- Professor Lauren Rickards, The Centre for Reworlding. Interim Director of the Urban Futures ECP and coleader of the Climate Change Transformations research program, RMIT
Registration inclusions:
- Travel to venue.
- Day catering.
- AFAC22 Welcome Drinks in the exhibition.