YEAR ONE //
SEED LAB + HUB ACTIVATIONS
The YEAR ONE project exists under the larger SPECULATIVE SOLIDARITIES/ umbrella of activations, protocols, and related programming. When brought to an organization, public space, community site or institution it can be built as a temporary, mobile, or iterative structure (shipping container, dome, tent,etc) or installed in an existing building or structure, even in an otherwise transitory space.
YEAR ONE HUBS + LABS are autonomous spaces for communities to build / practice / envision / study the ways in which human may need to find themselves practicing / providing collective care, resource sharing, research, and other interpersonal services as our relationship to and reliance on institutions shifts.
This project / initiative is OPEN SOURCE and can be facilitated by Autonomous Mechanics / Elæ Moss and/or built by and in community with attribution using the tools and protocols available here. It is designed to be scalar based on the capacities of partner sites, and can be offered as part of programming and/or curriculum, with workshops, skillshares, performance, courses, etc.
Learn more about the conceptual grounding of this project on my artist’s archive site.
PRECEDENT PROJECTS: It its physical, iterative Field Station / HUB / Seed Lab form, YEAR ONE includes elements of my earlier Speculative Seed Library project (2019-ongoing), the Speculative Resilience Radical Practice Library and Lab (2018-ongoing), Open Field Work Protocol elements (2016 - ongoing), Future Form (2013-ongoing) and so on.
HISTORY / RECOGNITION: YEAR ONE grew out of a 2021 proposal for open source resilient system and tool building which went on to the semifinals for consideration for the David Prize in NYC. The project’s next iteration was proposed as a set of blueprints, tools and a full model build of a YEAR ONE HUB, which was shortlisted for a Creative Time award in 2022. The project has been supported by a solo residency at Some Serious Business in Abiquiu, New Mexico (2022), a Public Action Fellowship at Bennington College (2022-24), and the Woodbury Art in the Public Realm Grant (2023).
SITES / ITERATIONS / RELATED EXHIBITIONS, PROGRAMS + INSTALLATIONS:
Future Form: [Sonnet] / Research, Language is then Sound is Now @ “Books Without Words,” a 3 person show at Undercurrent Projects, NY, 2013
“How to Human,” @ Next Edge Convergence, Montreal, Canada, 2015.
Building Interpersonal Infrastructures @ SOHO20 Gallery, NY, 2018
Collaborative Precarity Bodyhacking for Resistance Fantasies / Exponential Festival @ Target Margin Theater, NY, 2019 [Workbook here]
APRIORI Lab / Workstation // Speculative Seed Library and Open Field Work @ STWST / Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria) and Usdan Gallery (Bennington, VT), 2019
“How to Human: Disruptor Mechanism Protocol Training Level I,” @ Performing Knowledge Festival, Segal Center Theater, NY, 2019
Speculative Resilience Radical Practices Library + Lab @ The Anarchist Bookfair, Judson NY (2019), Bushwick Open Studios (2019), as part of Move Semantics: Rules of Unfolding @ EFA Project Space (2021; co-curated with Jeff Kasper), as part of the YEAR ONE | SEED LAB, Bennington College, VT (2023-24).
“Archive, Mesh and Spore: Speculative Infrastructures for an Abolitionist Future,” closing talk for the XIV Annual NYC Anarchist Bookfair, 2020.
“Speculative Solidarities,” online video series for IG / archived on YouTube, 2020-ongoing.
YEAR ONE Speculative Solidarities Salon @ Some Serious Business, Abiquiu, NM, 2022.
YEAR ONE | SEED LAB @ the Center for the Advancement of Public Action (CAPA), and ARCHIVE + ACCESS - PUBLICATION AS PUBLIC ACTION @ Crossett Library, SITES + SOUNDS (mapped project, sites vary) Bennington College, North Bennington, VT (2023-24).
“Spring into Action” Zine + Public Action Fairs, and ongoing YEAR ONE / Speculative Solidarities interventions, @ Left Bank Gallery, North Bennington, 2023-present.
Autonomous Mechanics x Another Audience / SITES + SOUNDS @ Black Hole Hollow, South Arlington, VT, 2023-24.
SAMPLE PROGRAMMING for SITE ITERATION
As a Public Action Fellow at Bennington College, 2022-24 [Recipient of the Woodbury Foundation “Art in the Public Realm” Grant, 2023, for these offerings]:
Related coursework offered for the Bennington community includes Future Histories, Speculative Sites 1 (F22) & 2 / Year One:Seed Lab (S23), Archive + Access: Publication, Pedagogy + Mutual Aid as Public Action (F23), and Year One: Social Practice as Public Action (S24).
Related YEAR ONE | SEED LAB “Spring into Action” Zine + Public Action Fairs were held at the Left Bank Gallery in North Bennington in the Spring of 2023; project zines from students and collaborators are now available as a Left Bank Open Resource Library and Zine Exchange -- add one using this form! Zines will be added to the OS Open Access Library for public use, access, and distribution.