Thinking-feeling otherwise: A forest refuge
The forest is embracing,
the rhythms are earthly,
the sounds are nurturing,
the skies are lightened,
the soil is buzzing.
The house is quirky.
The Forest University is on a journey of supporting unoffered worlds. Worlds in which beings are intertwined in mutual care, suffering and wonder. Worlds bold in refusal of prefabricated, exploitative, universalising ways of being. Worlds gentle in acceptance of loving, symbiotic, pluriversal search for all which nurtures life.
The territory of FU will be one of the sanctuaries for thinking-feeling otherwise. For weird and moving questions, for crazingly enmashed propositions, for radically open politics, for convivial economies, for grounded spiritualities, for subversively symbiotic cultures, for floating dances, for occult philosophies, and other ways unknown.
FU is welcoming those who need a temporary refuge from (dis)comforts of the “worlds on offer” to seed other worlds within and beyond themselves.
You can work on your questionings, explorations, writings, propositions, poems, art-works, dwellings, gardens, ecologies, activisms and all else which calls you. This is an un-disciplining opportunity, even though you might want to push the borders of a certain disciplinary frameworks.
When
Forest refuge opens its doors once in each season. The stay can be from a week long, to a month long.
Where
In the refuge there is:
- One single person room, which can be turned into a double room.
- A double room
- A shared living room, bath and kitchen.
Therefore, there are hosting options if you are on your own, a duo or a collective. Just indicate your needs in the application.
Food
The food and covering food expenses is your responsibility, and there are different food options available.
- Food-making can be your own responsibility, and you have a fully operational kitchen available. In this case, we can assist you in going for a grocery once a week, and you can also use a local bus or a bike that is shared for the time of your stay to do the grocery yourself. We highly encourage plant based, low waste, as local as possible choices for food, and we accept vegetarian diets if necessary.
- Another option would be to arrange one or all meals in Šumska1 homestead, which are our neighbours, and which run a plant-based kitchen with amazingly delicious food. They have the price list, and we can arrange the discount for longer stays.
- You can mix these two options, cooking for yourself when you want and going to Šumska1 or any other restaurant, when you do not feel like cooking.
In addition, we practice one collective meal a week, where we can share and meet each other over the food and cooking.
Travel
Each of you will organise, fund and explore ways to reach the FU in your own way. Ours is to say that the exploration of unoffered worlds does not start at the FU refuge, but the moment when you start heading towards us.
If you do not have to fly over oceans or deserts, we strongly encourage you to explore ways to reach us that are to the ground, so that your refuge experiences include your physical journey in even more layered and regenerative way. This can be by bike, by train or bus, by hitchhiking or coming with a full car, or by foot if you are for a more radically rooted experience. If you want some ideas and concepts behind other types of mobilities, check this article we have wrote a few years ago for artists and cultural workers.
Additional information will be published with the first open call here in the fall of 2024.
