Hello!
Welcome to Love Letters to a Liveable Future – and thank you for joining our quest for imagining otherwise.
This page accompanies the postcards you have been sent which invites you to imagine a world that takes climate crisis seriously. It takes the present context as a sign that things can, and do, change extraordinarily quickly: that what feels impossible today feels completely normal tomorrow.
Here you will find some of our own responses to the postcards – some written, some filmed – as well as audio you can use to help you in some of the tasks.
Remember:
- The cards can be played in any order (although warming up first is always good)
- There is no ‘right time’ to try this – or right way of going about it
- There are no right or wrong answers
- If you aren’t sure, make it up
When you have finished, please consider SHARING YOUR DREAMS with us – you will be contributing to a collective dreamscape that will become part of our next live theatre show, Love Letters to a Liveable Future.
Love
Anna-Maria Nabirye, Charlie Folorunsho, Jess Mabel Jones, Shôn Dale-Jones, Stefanie Mueller, Tom Ross-Williams, Lucy Wray & Zoë Svendsen.
Love Letters to a Liveable Future builds on two previous works with the same team – Factory of the Future and WE KNOW NOT WHAT WE MAY BE. In both we explored and imagined stories of alternative futures in the context of planetary flourishing, working with a wide variety of experts (you can see talks from some of them here).
POSTCARD: IMAGINING OTHERWISE
Here is a playlist of music for inspiration. We’d love to hear any recommendations for additions to the list: METIS@artsadmin.co.uk.
You might want to listen before, during, or after playing – some find it helpful to create a zone, others find it distracting. We’ve selected these tracks because they have made us think differently about the project, or the project has made us think differently about the tracks.
POSTCARD: WARM UP #1
For these first two WARM UPs, press play, close your eyes and imagine…
POSTCARD: WARM UP #2
IMPOSSIBLE IS NOT A FACT. IT'S AN ATTITUDE
Christiana Figueres
POSTCARD: WARM UP #3 LOOP THE LOOP
We are living in turbulent times, and it can feel very difficult to stay in the dream-space of imagining it could be otherwise. Love Letters to a Liveable Future is partly driven by our sense of the difficulty of dreaming – the issues of who feels entitled to dream, whose dreams get crushed, the way that the culture tells us repeatedly that dreaming of positive change is unrealistic or pointless.
However, the project is also committed to the idea that in order to agitate effectively, it is not enough to dismantle. At the same time, models of other ways of doing things need to be constructed – fleshed out and constantly reconfigured and improved on.
This project seeks to rehearse those acts of imagining – and this warm up offers a starting point, a way of understanding the position(s) each of you and your households might be in, at this moment in time, in relation to activating the imagination.
HOPE IS A VERB
POSTCARD: A BRILLIANT DAY...TRANSFORMED
We have filmed our responses to these postcards.
In the first video, the whole of the performer team imagine their brilliant day.
In the second video, Jess explains some of the transformations that might be needed to create her brilliant day in which all humans and the environment can thrive and flourish.
TAKE CARE
POSTCARD: YOU ARE NOT ALONE
In this video, Charlie explains the inspiration behind this postcard.
live for the future
POSTCARD: RIGHT UP MY STREET
Share your map of the future with us! Details below #liveablefuture
For ideas of local action why not take a look at The Alternative UK
POSTCARD: SCRIPTING THE FUTURE
Imagine your liveable future, responding to these questions:
we know what we are but know not what we may be
Ophelia, Hamlet
POSTCARD: THIS HOUSEHOLD IS
This postcard invites you to tell us a bit about who you are – anything you like that gives us some context.
THE HOUSEHOLDS WHO MADE THESE POSTCARDS ARE: A household of 4, Solo with a distant lover and daughter living separately, Solo with violent neighbours, Single, Unmarried couple, Household of 2.5, Solo with 2 vibrators, Married couple with a grown up daughter not living here, Living together for 20 years, Living on our own for the first time, Solo with an active neighbour, Two up two down Victorian terrace, London, Street with a pub on the corner, Filth – Failed In London Tried Hastings, NB poly, Straight as hell, African Caribbean born in London, A foreigner, Soon to become a foreigner, Welsh, British, British-Ugandan, European, Brought my daughter up in second language, White, Grey, Without co-morbidities, Child of refugee parents, Mother, Grandchild of refugees, Neurodivergent kid of disabled parents, Immunosuppressed, Hopeful, Plant lover, Plant mother, Plant based, With a disregarding housing association, In a house we try to get out of, With a park across the road, In a household where we speak about everything, Shout at the radio, Live near a park on a hill where I can see the city and imagine it differently, Live in a small city near a train station, In a house that fits us perfectly, On a main road, Alive on my bicycle, Beach dweller, Self employed, Whale lover, Glaring at the Lambeth palace, Banana bread baker, Potterer (I don’t mean making pots), Carless, Quilt maker, Longing for a hug, Kitchen clubber, Proud of the history of my health, In love, Heart broken, Carb eater, Home schooler, Starting over, Recently unemployed, Trying to stay young, Trying to stay hopeful, Trying to stay sane, healthy, curious, sexual, Trying to listen, Spending a lot of time on the allotment, Allotment dreamer, Allotment maker, Trying not to judge, New auntie, Sons and daughters of old people, Train users, No more DIY to do, Travelers, Dreamers, Peace lovers, Harmony makers, Story gatherer, Bereaved, Open to suggestion, Related to NHS workers, Jews, Furious about NHS workers, Socially distanced dater, Technologically literate until things move too fast, Not scared of crying unless someone is going to laugh at me, Procrastinator, Late riser, Early riser, Insomniac, Hot, Dancers, Movers, Shakers, Lovers, Hula hoopers, Looking for action
Jess Mabel Jones, Charlie Folorunsho, Tom Ross-Williams, Stefanie Mueller, Anna-Maria Nabirye, Shôn Dale-Jones. Photo credit: Simon Daw
CREATE TO REGENERATE
Kate Raworth
POSTCARDS: OUT OF TODAY ANOTHER TOMORROW
Please use these postcards to write, sketch or collage your responses (individually or as a household). You might want to fill them in as you play, or to draw your thoughts together afterwards.
To share your visions of a liveable future with us, please:
- Post your cards to Nicky Childs, Artsadmin, Toynbee Studios, 28 Commercial Street, London, E1 6AB
- Photograph your cards and email them to METIS@artsadmin.co.uk
- Share photos of your cards @MetisProjects / @metisprojectsuk #liveablefuture
- Arrange a video call to tell us about what you’ve imagined: METIS@artsadmin.co.uk
- Send a postcard or share one digitally to continue the conversation with a friend
When you share your liveable futures with us, please remember to include the card THIS HOUSEHOLD IS. Your stories will be contributing to a collective dreamscape that will become part of Love Letters to a Liveable Future, a live improvisation theatre show in 2021.
I feel like this is a rehearsal for our global response to climate change... We just saw things change utterly – we could do human civilisation in a different way.
Ezra Furman, May 2020
