The Ugly Side of Care

Description

The workshop The Ugly Sides of Care, developed within the Care Ecologies research group of ARIAS, explores the tensions, limitations, and blind spots embedded in practices of care, particularly in collaborative artistic and research contexts. Rather than framing care as inherently positive, the workshop foregrounds how intentions to be “care-full” can obscure conflict, difference, and even produce unintended harm.

Through facilitated exercises and discussions, participants are invited to map and reflect on “care frictions”—moments where care breaks down, becomes unevenly distributed, or reveals underlying power dynamics. The workshop treats care as a situated, relational practice shaped by specific contexts, bodies, and conditions, emphasizing the need to engage with complexity rather than resolve it prematurely.

The workshop functions as a critical and reflective space, using artistic and participatory methods to unpack how care operates in practice, and to develop more nuanced, attentive approaches to collaboration within interdisciplinary environments.

Period	26 Nov 2025
Event type	Workshop