ENG
We cordially invite you to a lecture titled "Social Gardening" by prof. Seán Cubitt, which will take place at the Faculty of Humanities on October 9th, 2026, 14:30 - 16:30, in Jan Sokol Auditorium.
Resumé:
Gardens have been little paradises since the Garden of Eden, and far beyond the limits of the Judaeo-Christian tradition. Enclaves of multi-species desire, gardens bring people, tools and techniques, plants and animals together in a shared commons. Palace gardens of the rich and powerful were always maps of order and control. Even suburban gardens succumb to the rules of private property. But social gardening, from resistance to enclosures at the end of the European Middle Ages all the way to post-1945 reconstruction of bombed cities and the emergence of guerrilla gardening collectives, steered towards another star. This talk celebrates cosmopolitan communal gardens, the aesthetic project of place-making shared by people, tools and ecologies.
Author's bio:
Seán Cubitt is Honorary Professorial Fellow of Screen Studies at the University of Melbourne. His publications include The Cinema Effect, EcoMedia, The Practice of Light, Finite Media, Anecdotal Evidence, Truth and Good. Currently completing a book on beauty, he researches media arts, ecocritique and the history and philosophy of media.