## What do we want to achieve at the end of this session?
- framing differently what jftr is doing
- include different type of members
- explore what is our vzw with time (time dimension). How do we think about time?
- what can JFTR be for us?
- what can JFTR be for others?
- is everything public?
- explore the organigram of JFTR
- what do we do now and in the future?
- what do we do with others?
- what from the past do we want to bring to the future?
- what do we do well in our dynamic?
- what external model do we find exciting?
- who would we like to invite or to work with?
- how can JFTR support that?
- outside of lack of time, what blocked us to do stuffs?
- what do we want to leave in the past? (suitcases)
ROI
- to who do we want to adress this ROI?
- what should be in it and can we add or phrase it in an interesting way? (recipe, …)
- what format? Can we make it an interesting/exciting/playful document? (with more formal parts but maybe some more playful parts)
- how can we activate our ROI? evolving document…
## Planning
- some kind of draft of ROI
- classic fire ceremony (yes / no list)
- futurology
A conversation of needs:
Loraine: Clearity of what is expected of each others +1
Sarah: Knowing if we go on or if we stop?
How to relieve the heaviness of the asbl (if it for example becomes more of a club then is there a point to the asbl?)
Mia: need to continue is that it's stays close to her practice. Don't have a lot of space to have many different trajectories. her practireces needs of feeding each other.
Loraine: we are still not sure what do we want to do.
Timewise, Loraine is suppose to work on her phd and need to be carefull dealing with commitement in the next 18 months
Sarah: what is the electrifying things we want to set up?
It's been a while that we are in this situation (a feeling that the structure is a main reason to continue, and not the most meaningful)
And timewise, work in la Cambre is also taking some brain space. I can't postpone anything from this job so it takes a different brain space.
Mia: don't need the asbl. But would need some deadline/timeline. we could shade some structure and add some other structures.
Keep a structure. Blocking things far ahead is good, for instance.
Would love some timeline and agenda for the project, that has enough space for our other engagements (we sometimes overlooked meetings — how to get there?)
One way of continuing is to have a quite precise goal or project. That makes links with our practices.
In a way what we do is artistic/design research.
What did we find exciting during the past JFTR years?
( - what from the past do we want to bring to the future?)
Sarah: Collective energy, starting from the Wikipedia-work that we did, empowering through the collectivity was very important.
We all have very interesting projects but we don't manage to put it into this space. When we have the AG I am always super impressed with what we have done, even if I feel like we did nothing.
When we talk about output I still feel like we could still do this publication, but we are a bit stuck there, and I don't know exactly what is blocking us, well time I suppose.
I really felt nourished by all this collaboration and work that I could bring to all my work & life, and it was never "just work" it has always been something else than work.
Mia: to continue on that, also felt very nourishing, one of biggest highlight/treasure, is that is really impacted how Mia wants to do work, be in a collaborative setting. And after being part of other collectives we have a wonderful way to communicate with each other. We stood behind any action as a group, never bringing back things to individual decisions. Also feels that there really is something in the publication/toolbox thing, know we tried two times (officially) — perhaps we would need to more precisely define what we would like to do. Convinced there is someting to share out of these experiences. Really enjoyed working with you! Nice dynamics, leaning/suggesting, not over-powering, …
Loraine: Agree with the above:) Sharing and learning together was the strongest, strongest highlight when I look back. I have a feeling I built my feminist approach when I was with you, like methods and way of working. The focus on tools was also very important. For me it was a way to learn political works and thoughts and how to work with them. I loved this, and I am still learning tools with you (futurology). This is at the core of what I found exciting about JFTR. Cyber feminist angle was and is still important.
I also thought about this work with the publication, but thought I shouldn't push for it because we already have a website. Would be fun to do, but not as a documentary but as a project in itself, as a last attempt at trying this. I am also a bit afraid that if we stop, and we don't have a project, that two years fly by and we don't see each other.
JFTR changed my life (Sarah, Mia: YAY!)
But I also don't want to become too nostalgic and and hold onto something that becomes a burden.
Sarah: adds that there is also a wonderful network! (everybody: oh yeah) we created other branches, and that was super interesting and powerful. So that's why if it has to stop — sees it as branches of JFTR (so not in the past, closed)
Makes Sarah sad to stop but also super happy when sees us doing cool projects (BBB, Bad, …)
I trust us that we will manage to see each other, even if we are very busy with work in our lives ;)
… and at the same time it's also nice to have the AG!!
+ we are still in January, we still have one year to decide. It's also ok not to have specific projects. This reflection year is here for that. But then good to take an appointment in a few months!
Mia: talking about network, is proud of the courage, boldness that came with beeing a non yet established worker/artist.
Today we are very used to realy on our own (practice, reputation) but good to remember
Power of JFTR that is its own entity and space to invite others.
Cyber feminist angle is still relevant, we really explored feminisms in plural and has shapes our mind.
confidence on many levels
it gave us some space and time to shape
we are good at taking a tool, political idea or tactic and picking it appart/explore it enough to make it our own and make it possible to know what is our position on it.
Wouldn't do a nostalgic thing, but rather using what we learned live, in the process (picking appart skill)
If we would stop, we would have to consciently have to find ways to see each other/meet
Work, or re-work that muscle (making appointment, making time)
Still January. Using the picking appart skill on ourselves, feels nice
Loraine: I agree :) Not much to add. We could still do a fake AG, even if we don't have one. But I still don't see so many friend ASBL's that we could rely on, with common interests, so for the ASBL I am not emotionally bound to it, it is quite heavy. I'm not sure I could take care of the admin.
Sarah: I don't mind, but yes it is some work, but mostly it is about the "why am I doing this?" "What have we done with JFTR?"
Loraine: I thought you were thinking about how to come back to your practice, and how about this connection?
Mia: feels quite done with Wikipedia (but not media wiki), feels less relevant, not a focal point anymore.
What feels close to my practice is the method we have in the way we talk and work collectively, and talking about tools and topics like recording/archiving, … this still feels very connected and even part of her self-interest (stronger within JFTR but also doing it aside)
Would be nice to see the different recaps for the AGs, very nostalgic in a way, but interesting thing to do, specially when you have a feeling you didn't do much!
Sarah: brought a bit as much as OSP, deconstruction of things, for OSP it was more open source, proprietary, etc. With JFTR it brought something very complementary, could bring it back to the collective work OSP!
Loraine: I somehow already touched on it, but about this nuanced approach to feminisms, to the tools in digital and physical (and other) realms, to complexify a topic or an approach. I'm also confident because of this experience that it is going to be related to what I am interested in. Like futurolgy, was related to things I'm thinking of, but not have words/tools for. A space for sharing and learning together is something I keep to come back to. Wikipedia workshops, we still get invitations, and I'm still interested in this.
Broad list of people with who we would like to work within JFTR
Types of members:
- club member
- satelite members: people who can give an advice on what we do, and enlarge the network or make connections in "spaces" we are not / without obligation
- A member (rotating member?) taking care of accounting
- A member (rotating member?) who has a specific focus on deadlines or communicates deadlines and timeline issues.
Types of meetings:
- twice a year sharing session
- twice a year dinner in which we talk work
- once a year is a retreat
- mailinglist
- surveys
The year of reflection, sketch of calendar:
- Lescheret - Imagining how we go from here
- A meeting to prepare for AG reflections — this Spring
- AG before June where we are further (set) — a moment in the year of reflection
- plan time for discussions — maybe we manage to meet in person? would be better than a hybrid meeting
- accounting things to sign, projection (plan for next year, future)
- plan another follow-up moment to implement what we discussed, to discuss what we feel about what was said, etc.
- Follow up and/or extraordinary AG
Expectations of time and commitment:
- Quite clear that we need a meeting before the next AG
- Either we have concrete ideas that we discuss with the AG members and later work on how we work on it.
- Next semester do we have a worksession perhaps.
- during a long internal meeting: CLAY — thinking objects?
INTERESTING FRAGMENTS:
- more active community and/or network — taken from different angles, like mailinglist/newsletter (or other things?)
- publication
- resilience and resistance, feminist theories made into tools
- JFTR talking group, reading group, support group… (less public activities more community)
- clear plan and knowing what we are expecting
- addressing means/money/labour — talking about money but not doing it for the money
- topics addressed:
- rewriting history from outside the dominant structures
- accessibility questions in rewriting history/publication and digital ones, accessible design (who can publish/read, …)
- collective structures tools (reflection space for being/working in a collective, unions, etc)
- things hard to document/capture in history (oral history, installations, nature taking a picture of a mountain, the sky, fleeting beauty, “beautyfleet”), hardest to record
- title: “Not for the record” secret sharing group
- oral / written traditions/practices/translations (for instance talking about alpahbetisation: still so much can be done, as tools etc, but also to question this “incentive” >>> “development”)
- digital maintenance // physical maintenance (cleaning, sorting, care) — labour questions
- repetition — central in history writing, publication / joyfullness in repetition
- exercise/experience in Futurology: Tycoon (repeating part of the torah to learn during a whole night), repeating exercise again which creates difference (cf in Buda in April)
- Niko Leung work on copy (Honkongese internship in China)
- collective energy
- sharing and learning together
- empowering and nourishing, impactful, life changing :)
- publication/toolbox
- cyberfeminism
- wonderful network
- branches (interesting and powerful)
- courage boldness (<-> network)
- trust
- feminisms in plural
- some space and time to shape (learning and sharing)
- taking a tool, political idea or tactic, and picking it appart/explore it enough to make it our own
- CLAY — thinking objects
NOT:
doing goodies for money / but goodies for the fun of it yes :)nostalgic documentary
Sharing/affinity meetings option:
- not before 2023 :)
- goals?
- what type of invitation?
- why would I prioritize that?
- why am I invited?
- too open format? (Constant)
- flexibility and openness
- removed “group”, “club” (?) as in book club
- “Not so secret club” :)
- disorder of architects (as order ---- union)
- what can be fixed can be the way we organize it
- fixed dates (regularity), comfortable for everyone, like 3 times a year (next time I want to come it's clear)
- someone might realise and organize in relation with their schedule & propositions
- Other types of clubs/meeting; example des Samedies
- afraid: that it could become only a few people
Publication option:
- light way: first reading room BAL, fragments in a publication
- 3/4 meetings a year
- each meeting => one page (or more) of notes or drawings, receipe, …
- slowly building a 4 page publication :D small format publications
- decided at the end of a session: what do we contribute
- could be also that we do a publication residency with things from our pads or previous experiences
- for instance: I want to bring back a discussion with Cristina in the past in this new context! Picking things from the past that have a new relevance, forgotten, …
Sustainability? :-)
- one option:
- working for free, everybody does the 3-4 meetings for free + mutualizing the minimum expenses (triodos costs and cloud etc)
- we keep the asbl for one year extra (can we make an asbl sleep for two years?)
- or can we find a cheap way to keep the accounting? + expenses of website etc.
- Reactivating the network while we decide if we continue with the asbl
- it could be a way for us to still take the time to test it, beacuse it's a new model for us, a moment to reactivate the network, to test the model… is it sustainable for us? is it nice?
AG questions for our board <3
- Can we make an asbl sleep for two years?
- What are the rules of a “sleeping” asbl? (Mia asks Donatella before the AG)
- Who knows an accountant we can switch to after Jacques, or mutualizing the minimum expenses (triodos costs and cloud etc)?
============================================
### what is the question?
Ask strong questions! (no ‘yes/no’-Q). How, what, what if, why (but careful with why)
Important to take the time to ask the right question(s) = basis for the rest of the work
Good questions – think of the following 3 dimensions:
- Construction: how is it crafted? (make it short! Be able to remember it)
- Scope: people in the room have to have the capacity to act on it
- Assumptions
Note: Important to make sure that people are really invested in the topic. Otherwise the whole process of futuring stays at a distance and is hard.
What can just for the record be for us? for other?
### grow, collapse, discipline, transform
JFTR growing
- more people
- growing our tools
- big workshop
- more international
- model that can be replicated
- more active community and/or network
- full time job for us
- more income
- subsides
- products
- consultant
- paid commissions (punctual, or more regular, like fixed workshops)
- mailinglist
- Community lead
- there would be multiple JFTRs
- jftr studio
- We would be ambassadors/representatives of JFTR — which could create joy going down, some sens of disconnections
- Has it grown too big and therefore away from us?
JFTR collapsing/burning/composting
- Closing admin
- Archives
- - organised into what is public and what is private ?
- - how do we make it readable or distribute it ?
- - hard drive, cloud, pad > how to maintain it?
- - website (maintenance? paying domain name + server)
- - publication?
- - Is there an afterlife of the material?
- - To whom do we share it?
- Other scenarios:
- - Is it collapsing just for us or is it for everyone?
- - Can it be taken over by other people? (relai or ending?)
- - is there a need or space for JFTR in this collapsed world?
- - what if just the asbl closes and JFTR goes on off the record?
- - what if JFTR isn't a public activity? (ex: talking group, reading, support group…)
- - what if we just keep asbl stays and JFTR is more an umbrella to do work?
- - JFTR could continue off the record, like hidden
- - what if the whole world collapses ;)
JFTR discipline -- just for the money / just for two interesting projects
- Making two events a year + a big project that is using the ASBL
- A structure with high commitment
- More money should go to accounting and maintenance (website): more percentage or same percentage but more budget = 1500€ (currently with our 10% = 15'000€)
- we could try to get 300€ for admin with two workshops (2 x 1'500€), and a 1200€ for admin out of a bigger project (for instance with 10% 12'000€)
- so either we ask more money, otherwise we will need to work more for free to pay the admin
- With discipline going up our joy goes down
- - frustrations with compromise of ideology (saying yes to something just because of money)
- - rename: Just for the money ;)
- - lack of meetings / disconnection
- - this sense of why bother with so much admin for that?
- - collective aspect is a bit gone, we haven't work so much together, are we a collective only in the name?
- - sense of being part of a business rather than a collective (different mode of working, support network)
- - is it a question of number of events?
Other scenario: just for the discipline but not only for money
- - we are funding JFTR
- - but still not doing more than what we are doing now
- - then we are very picky about what we do
- - more pedagogy to explain why more budget is important + more time selecting (networking) — talking about money but not doing it for the money (wages for wages against)
- - redirecting cool and well paid projects from our own practice to JFTR
JFTR transform
- Big transformations (methods, and also contents)
- no wikipedia workshops
- JFTR becomes a talking and/or reading group, circulating knowledge sessions, support group (~unionizing):
- - specific angle? focal point? (at least for the begining)
- - rewriting history from outside the dominant structures, ex: Brussels history
- - accessibility questions in rewriting history/publication and digital ones, accessible design (who can publish/read, …)
- - collective structures tools (reflection space for being/working in a collective, unions, etc)
- - things hard to document/capture in history (oral history, installations, nature taking a picture of a mountain, the sky, fleeting beauty, “beautyfleet”), hardest to record
- - title: “Not for the record” secret sharing group
- - oral / written traditions/practices/translations (for instance talking about alpahbetisation: still so much can be done, as tools etc, but also to question this “incentive” >>> “development”)
- - digital maintenance // physical maintenance (cleaning, sorting, care) — labour questions
- - us hosting, deciding on topics?
- - you commit to regular sharing sessions and to give one presentation
- - ex: 15 members and you do your permanence (gasap-inspired) with another person
- - where: Papa Douala, at our space or Online on BBB
- - incomes:
- - MINIMAL membership, coop to support at least maintenance
- - MORE bigger membership, merch, …
- - Examples: Norwegian unions and smaller unions with memberships, Germany, Sara Kaaman and the book The Natural Enemies of Books: A Messy History of Women in Printing and Typography on unions…
- we do a clay club and sell our products
AFTER LUNCH
JUST FOR THE RECORD
- has grown
- has collapsed
- has been diciplined
- has tranformed
I invite you to make yourself comfortable: sit, lounge, lie down, - whatever feels right to be doing this morning in this room.
We’ll have a short 'closed eye visioning' session, a kind of mental time travel guided by a series of questions, where you’ll travel to different possible futures in your mind’s eye.
We won’t push to share what you saw later, so just relax and see what emerges - it doesn’t matter how incoherent, nonsensical or even embarrassing things you might encounter. They’ll be just passing thoughts. They don’t reflect on 'you' or your personality. Just observe them come and go as reactions to my questions.
Take a few deep breaths. With each breath you travel a year into the future. In and out, we are now 5 years from now ... in and out,
further and further into the future. We are now about 15 years from now. We go a bit more, some few more breaths, maybe 20, 25 years from now. In and out.
And when you’re ready, open your mind’s eye and land... you are in a world where every JFTR continued to grow as it does today. Everything continued to grow. There is more of JFTR in every sense, and the world has kept growing. There is more
- more people
- growing our tools
- big workshop
- more international
- model that can be replicated
- more active communitie and/or network
- full time job for us
- more income
- subsides
- products
- consultant
- paid commissions (punctual, or more regular, like fixed workshops)
- mailinglist
- Community lead
- there would be multiple JFTRs
- jftr studio
- We would be ambassadors/representatives of JFTR — which could create joy going down, some sense of disconnections
- Has it grown too big and therefore away from us?
Imagine waking up in this world. What do you do first? What wakes you up in the morning? You start your morning ritual, in this world of growth. Do you feel hungry? Look around the place you woke up. What do you see around you? Who is around you and how are they behaving? How have you been growing yourself in this world?
****
With your next breath, let go of the JFTR Grow world. Let it dissolve into the background. Just focus on your breath. In and out… in and out… With the next breath another world comes into view. A world of JFTR Collapse. JFTR has collapsed, but so has everything else. The economy collapsed, social structures collapsed, the climate is spinning out of control as all tender balances collapsed, the environment suffering a rapid mass extinction. You just woke up from taking a nap in this world. Where are you? What do your clothes look like? You get up. Are you waking up where you live? You try to get in touch with a person dear to you. How do you communicate in this world? What does technology look like?
- Closing admin
- Archives
- - organised into what is public and what is private ?
- - how do we make it readable or distribute it ?
- - hard drive, cloud, pad > how to maintain it?
- - website (maintenance? paying domain name + server)
- - publication?
- - Is there an afterlife of the material?
- - To whom do we share it?
- Other scenarios:
- - Is it collapsing just for us or is it for everyone?
- - Can it be taken over by other people? (relai or ending?)
- - is there a need or space for JFTR in this collapsed world?
- - what if just the asbl closes and JFTR goes on off the record?
- - what if JFTR isn't a public activity? (ex: talking group, reading, support group…)
- - what if we just keep asbl stays and JFTR is more an umbrella to do work?
- - JFTR could continue off the record, like hidden
- - what if the whole world collapses ;)
****
Then, when you are ready, let go of this world. Focus on your breathing and let each breath take you away from JFTR Collapse… And then breathe in and while exhaling open the gates of a JFTR Disciplined world. Here we imposed rules and regulations to cap unlimited, unhealthy growth. Some of us are disciplined and have transformed our lives to become more sustainable. Others have rules imposed on them, through an intricate system of monitoring and consequences.
- Making two events a year + a big project that is using the ASBL
- A structure with high commitment
- More money should go to accounting and maintenance (website): more percentage or same percentage but more budget = 1500€ (currently with our 10% = 15'000€)
- we could try to get 300€ for admin with two workshops (2 x 1'500€), and a 1200€ for admin out of a bigger project (for instance with 10% 12'000€)
- so either we ask more money, otherwise we will need to work more for free to pay the admin
- With discipline going up our joy goes down
- - frustrations with compromise of ideology (saying yes to something just because of money)
- - rename: Just for the money ;)
- - lack of meetings / disconnection
- - this sense of why bother with so much admin for that?
- - collective aspect is a bit gone, we haven't work so much together, are we a collective only in the name?
- - sense of being part of a business rather than a collective (different mode of working, support network)
- - is it a question of number of events?
Other scenario: just for the discipline but not only for money
- - we are funding JFTR
- - but still not doing more than what we are doing now
- - then we are very picky about what we do
- - more pedagogy to explain why more budget is important + more time selecting (networking) — talking about money but not doing it for the money (wages for
- - redirecting cool and well paid projects from our own practice to JFTR
Which type of person are you? Disciplined or in need of disciplining? Or are you the person doing the disciplining, devising and implementing the rules? What does your work look like in this world? How do you live? Do you travel? And if you do, how do you do that?
****
We’re about to leave the Disciplined world, so take a deep breath and one last big push towards a JFTR Transformed world. A world where everything is different from your life today. Nothing is the same. What does that look like where JFTR has transformed completely? What does it feel like? Go outside, what can you smell, taste, hear, touch? Someone is passing in the street, what do they look like, what are they doing?
- Big transformations (methods, and also contents)
- no wikipedia workshops
- JFTR becomes a talking and/or reading group, circulating knowledge sessions, support group (~unionizing):
- - specific angle? focal point? (at least for the begining)
- - rewriting history from outside the dominant structures, ex: Brussels history
- - accessibility questions in rewriting history/publication and digital ones, accessible design (who can publish/read, …)
- - collective structures tools (reflection space for being/working in a collective, unions, etc)
- - things hard to document/capture in history (oral history, installations, nature taking a picture of a mountain, the sky, fleeting beauty, “beautyfleet”), hardest to record
- - title: “Not for the record” secret sharing group
- - oral / written traditions/practices/translations (for instance talking about alpahbetisation: still so much can be done, as tools etc, but also to question this “incentive” >>> “development”)
- - digital maintenance // physical maintenance (cleaning, sorting, care) — labour questions
- - us hosting, deciding on topics?
- - you commit to regular sharing sessions and to give one presentation
- - ex: 15 members and you do your permanence (gasap-inspired) with another person
- - where: Papa Douala, at our space or Online on BBB
- - incomes:
- - MINIMAL membership, coop to support at least maintenance
- - MORE bigger membership, merch, …
- - Examples: Norwegian unions and smaller unions with memberships, Germany, Sara Kaaman and the book The Natural Enemies of Books: A Messy History of Women in Printing and Typography on unions…
- we do a clay club and sell our products
Now look at yourself? What do you look like and how do people look to you? Where do you live? What do you do in your life in a transformed world? What do you care about? Who do you care for?
****
And finally, take one deep breath and close the portal to JFTR Transform. Take your time.
You float a bit out and just befor you are getting ready to turn towards home you glimpse a 5th future, a mix of all 4 and it
Focus on breathing and with every breath travel one year backward.
Take as long as you need to come back to the present... And when
you arrive, slowly open your eyes, stretch out and make sure that all your bits have returned safely
to the here and now. Welcome back.
(END)