Bar Bario | September 13th, 2023

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A golden koran earring, a mother's prayer blown over the head, “You Think You Know Me” - a resistance song, watercolor drawings, grandmother’s wig, community-grown tomatoes - reseeding toxic land, friendship beyond language difference, specific food and an embrace of the unknown in recovery, the deep-voiced mantra singing of Alice Coltrain, a writing pen, a bag of soil, alchemy and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's words, a notebook, a spinning top, spirits, bodies, voices, …

These, more objects and connecting stories were brought and shared around the table at [un]learning script’s opening session as artists, activists and researchers from various disciplines, connected through an open invitation to co-curate an ongoing program that would look towards the underlying scripts existent within collaborative research in scientific institutions, art spaces and communal contexts. 

We met for a nutritious Caribbean lunch at Bar Bario in Amsterdam where we shared stories and questions towards “ways of knowing”, prompted by personal objects brought and presented to the group. 

In this discussion, participants learned more about each other in this introductory event and the beginning of a fruitful collaboration, reflecting on how to unlearn, listen and understand which stories matter, and moreover, for whom?