Messy Studios are peer-to-peer gatherings conceived by Territorial Agency mobilizing critical thinking and research along the interconnected narratives and ecopolitical trajectories of “Oceans in Transformation.” Messy Studios engage scientists, artists, governmental and civil society groups, policy makers and conservationists to come together with the aim to forge new pathways for action and new imaginaries for the ocean.

Launch of the first trajectory "North Sea to Red Sea"

5–5.30 pm CET
Introduction by John Palmesino and Ann-Sofi Rӧnnskog

5.30–6 pm CET
Live discussion with Territorial Agency, Markus Reymann, Daniela Zyman, and the participants of the Ocean Fellowship Program

6–8 pm CET
Messy Studio: Acqua Alta - The Rising Waters, first session
Presentations by Nancy Knowlton (Marine scientist emeritus at the Smithsonian Institution); Jane Da Mosto (We are Here Venice); Klaas Kuitenbrouwer (Het Nieuwe Instituut) with Territorial Agency, Markus Reymann, Daniela Zyman, and the participants of the Ocean Fellowship Program.

The event will be live-streamed on Ocean-Archive.org and Ocean Space and TBA21–Academy Facebook pages.

Jane Da Mosto is an environmental scientist (MA, Oxford University, M. Phil. Imperial College London) with international experience as a consultant on sustainable development, climate change, and wetland ecology. Since 2012 she has been fully engaged in trying to change the future of Venice and for Venetians as co-founder of We are here Venice, an NGO that specializes in using the best available academic research and methodologies to characterize the challenges for Venice while also drawing upon grassroots networks to source accurate information on the city and lagoon. Since moving to Venice in 1995, she has worked on European Projects for local NGOs; Agenda 21 for Venice Municipality; a review of climate change research in Italy for the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme/CNR; the Venice in Peril Fund/Cambridge University five-year study “Flooding and Environmental Challenges for Venice and the Lagoon” and the “Venice Report” on demography, the repurposing of buildings, public finances, and tourism; the OECD Territorial Review of Venice, and the muf/British Council installation at the Architecture Biennale. weareherevenice.org

Nancy Knowlton is Marine Scientist Emeritus at Smithsonian Institution and a scientific leader of the Census of Marine Life. Prior to coming to the museum, she was on faculty of Yale University (1979-1984), a staff scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama (1984-1998), and on the faculty of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (1998-2007), where she founded the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation. She founded the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography of the University of California, San Diego. She is an Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellow, a winner of the Peter Benchley Prize and the Heinz Award, and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 2013. She helped direct the Census of Marine Life coral reef program and has served on the boards of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Coral Reef Alliance.

Klaas Kuitenbrouwer studied history at the University of Utrecht, developed an art practice that moved into the field of digital culture. Working at the intersection of different spheres of knowledge, between art, science, technology, and ecology, Kuitenbrouwer is currently a researcher at Het Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam with a focus on digital culture. Among other projects, he was responsible for the Garden of Machines (2015), 51Sprints (2016) and Gardening Mars (2018); at Neuhaus he co-curated A Temporary Transdisciplinary Academy for More-than-human Knowledge (2019) and is currently developing the zoöp project, a legal format for collaboration between humans and nonhuman collective bodies. He has been teaching media and other theory at the Rietveld Academy since 2002. A consistent element in his work has been the intersection of different knowledge practices: technological, artistic, legal, scientific, and nonhuman. zoöp project