Open City Thinking Biennial 2020

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Image courtesy of CCCB.

The second Open City Thinking Biennial is an occasion for people to meet, to look ahead and contemplate the future scenarios and possibilities that are opening up at a time of great uncertainty, leading us to re-evaluate the world as we now know it.

The first Biennial was held in 2018 with the aim of linking the debate on the role of present-day cities with the great challenges being faced by contemporary society, starting out from the basic conviction that cities, in particular, are the main settings for global transformations. This year, the same objective is framed in a new context, namely the global reach of the pandemic which has, once again, laid bare the limits of an exhausted system.

Today we are faced with situations of uncertainty that seem to be leading us to the same place: denial of the future. Yet, these circumstances, which have been able to make us rethink our permanently disrupted way of life, also open up the possibility for thoroughgoing changes. What might come out of this crisis? What new words do we need in order to create together and give sense to the world that is now being born?

In this year’s Biennial, the CCCB presents a program which, combining on-site and audiovisual formats, will highlight the need to think about this uncertain world, to share doubts and possibilities, and make of this exploration a celebration of civic commitment. With debates and lectures, as well as poetry, music and a range of theatrical performances and artistic events, the aim is to speak about our bond with the planet and its other species, to question the systems of exclusion that continue to divide people, to reflect on the question of what kind of freedom is left to us after the lockdown and, above all, to share futures that might improve our collective life.

During the Biennial, CCCB also offers the newly created project “A Vocabulary for the Future” which, taking the form of audiovisual capsules, sets up conversations among local and international visual creators, thinkers and writers. In a present that is already being perceived as a dystopia, this germinal vocabulary speaks out for the need to open up spaces for imagining alternative, more hospitable worlds. Without turning its back on some of the problematic features defining today’s reality, it traces out a new audiovisual lexicon that allows people to come together in sketching the world of tomorrow, a future that is at once promising and disturbing.

The Biennial is a project promoted by the Barcelona City Council with the participation of many of the city’s agents and entities.

For more events check our online events calendar.