BEWITCHING FUTURES
Divination, Somatics, Memory
A wholesome divination workshop offered by Promona Sengupta and diane daayan
WHAT IS THIS ABOUT?
Our workshop introduces divination methods and somatic practices as tools to carve empowering futurities against the backdrop of the (oft-oppressive) politics of memory. We engage divination and somatic practices as means of personal-political knowledge generation, encouraging participants to reflect upon their intersectional experiences to generate affirmative timelines and stories for ‘be-witch-ing’ futures.
This is primarily a workshop of empowerment. We will use liberatory speculation to create and hold space for non-judgmental encounters with generational stories (joys and pain). While our aim is to recognise inter-generational cycles of complicity and breaking the cycle of violence, this is a long form process and we want to explore and share without pushing people towards any pre-determined end goal.
WHO ARE WE?
Promona Sengupta (IG: @promo_sapien) is an artist, activist, curator and academic living in Berlin. Her activism work has most visibly been in leftist, feminist, intersectional and queer spaces, and she has slowly started focusing on sustainability of activism work and a rest-centered politics.
diane daayan (IG: @witchcraftispolitical) is a Berlin-based ‘un’settler witch and founder of Witchcraft Is Political, an initiative that employs divinatory tools to intuitively read signs and channel unhuman guidance to reclaim a lovingly political use of personal spiritual practices.
OUR VALUES
Unsettling given dynamics of power, productivity and ways of relating are important to us. We are particularly interested in restorative politics, whereby via gentle ways of self-reflection and self-accountability, we can deal with the wear and tear of being cast as ‘BIPOC bodies’ in unfriendly spaces. A restful practice would prepare us better for the everyday work of changing the material conditions of the world around us. Imagination is the realm which we want to feed, with the specific focus on empowerment.
WHAT’S OUR APPROACH?
Divination and tarot reading is known to be a complex practice, involving healing, play, imagination, affirmations etc. We look at somatic work and tarot reading as a gateway to clarifying burning personal and political questions… “What is to be done? Where am I in my life? Whose lives do I touch? What unaccountability have I experienced and how am I holding myself accountable in my relationships?….”
We will be workshopping with somatic practices and tarot readings, with in-depth exploration of visuality in the cards. We would like to workshop through visualization methods, grounding practices of the body and free imagination tools such as automatic writing and journaling to guide participants towards approaching tarot as a tool of personal and political empowerment, while also thinking about divination as a way of generating alternative knowledges. In doing so, we will focus upon how participants’ experience power/powerlessness in their everyday lives, and how divination and somatic practices may be used to create a more empowered personal account for them.
WHO IS THIS WORKSHOP (NOT) FOR?
This workshop is for people with experience of intersectional oppression who are interested in divination and somatic practices. It is open for everyone except cis white men. We particularly welcome queer and disabled people of colour.
Participants for this workshop need to come in with an open mind to divination and alternative spiritual practices. However, no prior familiarity with tarot, somatic or other divination practices is necessary. If you feel that delving into your experience of oppression within an inter-generational context is too much work at this time, this workshop is not for you. We understand that this can be exhausting work and there is no judgment should you choose to refrain.
WHEN?
11 September 2021, 1030h-1700h
(with Lunch Break in-between)
WHERE?
HOW?
Limited spaces available. Please register your interest on the IN*VISION website by 31st Aug.