2020 Wellbeing Culture Forum — A Year in Review

The Wellbeing Culture Forum launched in May 2020 as an expansion of our ongoing Therme Forum programming to address the onset of the global pandemic. The year-round talks programs featured fourteen public and private panel discussions, between online and offline spaces, gathering experts from diverse fields to exchange knowledge towards an enhanced vision of the city and its cultural activity in symbiosis with the natural world. The series was initiated by Therme Art and curated by Mikolaj Sekutowicz, who co-hosted each panel discussion together with various partners.

Overview video of the 2020 Wellbeing Culture Forum series.

The series commenced on the 20th of May with Re-Entering Reality, a Zoom session co-moderated by Arthur Mamou-Mani that considered the potential of virtual reality and its application in new kinds of experience art. This was then followed up by the first public discussion Art in Architecture – How Art Can Liberate Architecture (27 May), which was attended by tens of thousands of people worldwide. Held in collaboration with Serpentine Galleries and design leader Dezeen, the talk examined the relationship between art and architecture and was covered by major media outlets worldwide.

Over the summer, the Wellbeing Culture Forum continued with a series of highly-popular public virtual discussions realised in collaboration with the British Council, Dezeen, Manchester International Festival, and Sibiu International Theatre Festival. These conversations allowed us to use lockdown wisely—capitalising on a rare moment of quiet and stillness in order to reflect and to develop and exchange deep thoughts that question the norms of cultural programming and communication.

Emerging from lockdown in September, Therme Art collaborated with Berlin’s König Galerie during Gallery Weekend Berlin to realise From Breaking Bauhaus to Growing Gaia, an augmented edition of the Wellbeing Culture Forum. A culmination of months of online-only events, the in-real-life event featured seven panel discussions, two new artistic commissions by Egill Sæbjörnsson, and sustainable food experiences courtesy of innovative new initiative Therme Food Lab. The four-day interdisciplinary event attracted engaged audiences in Berlin and online from all over the world.

Overview video of our Wellbeing Culture Forum at Messe in St. Agnes during Gallery Weekend Berlin 2020.

Learn more about the Wellbeing Culture Forum and upcoming events here.