In August 2010 I created Future Editions, a conversation format based on the notion of human libraries, for an event at Forest Fringe during the Edinburgh Festival.
Future Editions harnessed the passions of 30 specialists from across Edinburgh, revealing their visions of what the future might hold for their particular field. The library included, among many, a champion wrestler, an ornithologist, a critic, an astrologer and a paramedic. Members of the public were invited to ‘borrow’ someone for a 10-minute conversation; during this exchange they shared ideas, dreams and reveries of what the future might look like, and afterwards these conversations spilled out anecdotally into the cafés, stairways and streets of Edinburgh.
A second edition of the human library focused on the climate crisis, with 40 experts ranging from activists to psychiatrists specialised in change, was created for Artsadmin’s Two Degrees Festival (2011) at Toynbee Studios, London.
