Last June 29th SARAS Institute hosted the Talk/Workshop: “Untangling resilience: Between memory and oblivion” at its Headquarters in Bella Vista. The activity was joined by a variety of people coming from the coastal area between Montevideo and Piriápolis and included neighbours, journalists, teachers, students and different professionals, all of which resulted in enriching exchanges and visions.

The activity started with a talk delivered by Néstor Mazzeo (SARAS Executive Director) who exposed, in a simplified way, the general ideas behind the concept of resilience. His exposition included practical demonstrations and examples that enabled the comprehension of the ideas, which were also enhanced by questions and discussions brought about by participants.

During the second part of the event, participants were gathered in two groups to work on a collective creativity workshop assignment facilitated by Silvana Juri (Communications Assistant at SARAS). The proposal seeked to generate an alternative and experiential approach to foster dialogue and deepen the ideas that are normaly associated to resilience by creating logical and perceptual links or associations during the co-building of a mobile object made out of branches, tweed and ideas captured on paper.

Each team commited to working in relation to one example or issue of their choosing, based on their backgrounds and interests. This fostered exchanges among participants who could learn about other realities, and contribute with different visions and approaches to the topics proposed collectively.

This all resulted in the creation of two pieces that represent the ideas woven by each group, and which enable to visualize the complexity of the issues selected as reflection triggers.

At the end of the activity, each group presented their piece in a dialogue that promoted further reflection on the ideas and expectations that participants held before the activity, and what eventually happened during that afternoon.

The adoption of methods and approaches that come from artistic fields are of special interest to SARAS Institute, where we seek to adopt experimental paths for approaching sustainabiliy related issues.

This activity was organized by SARAS and was part of the activities included in Green June, an initiative promoted by the Municipality of Maldonado, among other regional institutions.