retrofitted lab and library space in CAPA with shelving, a carroll, and cork boards against a white wall in a hallway; an assortment of books, scientific instruments, lab and field materials, including organic matter, are collected on the wall and furniture

YEAR ONE | SEED LAB

YEAR ONE SEED LABS and/or HUBS are speculative solidarity SITE projects which can be built to suit as new construction or retrofit into existing buildings, makeshift structures, and/or mobile units such as shipping containers, vans, or buses. 

Imagined as autonomous spaces for communities to build / practice / envision / study the ways in which humans (and collaborator species / technologies) may need to find themselves practicing and/or providing collective care, resource sharing, research, and other interpersonal services as our relationship to and reliance on institutions and social infrastructures shifts.

At Bennington, an iteration of this project was installed in the Center for the Advancement of Public Action (CAPA) from Spring 2023 through 2024, and supported a variety of on-campus projects, courses, and programs. It includes a version of the Speculative Resilience Radical Practice Library and Lab, Open Field Work Protocol elements, research from Future Form, and other Mutual Aid support projects. 

In conjunction with the on-campus ARCHIVE + ACCESS intervention installed for this same time period, this SITE operates as an active location for the collection and distribution of independent student research and DIY publications, including a rotating zine library. 

This zine library, in turn, seeded an ongoing adjacent location at the Left Bank gallery in North Bennington, where "Spring into Action" Year One | Seed Lab Zine and Public Activation Fairs were held in the Spring of 2023 by Moss and student Field Agents from the "Future Histories, Speculative Sites II: Year One Seed Lab" workshop / seminar. 

Details for Spring 2024 SEED LAB public programs, including Field, Library and Lab activations, skillshares, and teach-ins will be posted as they are finalized.

Precedent projects, programs and performances within the SEED LAB / SPECULATIVE SOLIDARITY protocol have been iterated widely, at sites including Undercurrent Projects (NY), SOHO20 Gallery (NY), Black Hole Hollow (VT), Judson Church (NY), STWST / Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria), and EFA Project Space (NY). The project's development was supported by a residency at Some Serious Business in Abiquiu, New Mexico in 2022. 

Learn more about the SEED LAB + HUB activation framework here.