Programme

The ways we work, learn, communicate and create are changing rapidly. Artificial intelligence is one of the most visible expressions of that transformation: it revives old questions and raises new ones about our abilities, decisions and relationships. We need places to make sense of what we are experiencing and think together about how we want to live. The urgency of change makes time for reflection, creation and encounter all the more important.

It means starting with people’s experiences: what they feel, imagine, need and value. We are interested in freedom, relationships, the body, vulnerability and our capacity to find meaning in life. Our worth extends beyond productivity or the tasks we can perform. We want to consider different ways of living and ask what conditions allow people to pursue them with dignity.

Anyone who is interested. We want to bring artists, philosophers, scientists, educators, technology professionals and people from other fields together with the public. Questions about human life call for different kinds of knowledge, as well as experience, sensitivity and listening. Everyone can contribute to a conversation about education, friendship, work or creativity; no technical knowledge is needed to take part.

Art is a way of exploring and expressing human experience. Through dance, painting, sculpture, literature or music, we can give form to what we feel, question the familiar and discover other ways of seeing. Artworks and performances will have a place of their own within the project and may enter into dialogue with its conversations. Artistic experience is part of what we want to share.

Museums bring together memory, creativity and knowledge. They allow us to pause before a work, encounter other periods in history and put the present in perspective. Here, our questions enter into dialogue with a wider history of human experience and expression. We also want museums to be places of encounter and conversation for diverse audiences, where culture helps us understand what we are living through.

The name draws on the connections between art, thought and inquiry that we associate with the Renaissance, and proposes renewing that spirit of curiosity and exchange. It expresses an aspiration: to expand our possibilities for creating, understanding and living together. That renewal requires choices, care and participation. We ask how a time of great change might also become an opportunity to enrich our cultural life, relationships and understanding of ourselves.

AI is one of the most visible symbols and drivers of change today. It brings us back to questions about creativity, intelligence, authorship and the value of our decisions. Its role will vary from one encounter to another: in some it will be an explicit subject; in others, part of the context for a wider conversation about the body, memory, care or the meaning of life. There is room for enthusiasm, criticism and uncertainty.

Possible themes include identity and dignity; art and creativity; education and independent judgement; inner life and relationships; work, time and meaning; the body and care; truth and freedom; and memory and the future. These are potential starting points for the encounters, rather than a confirmed programme.