Meet the Cooltzine vol.5 co-creators

“Cooltzine” vol.5, whose content and theme’s entirely defined by the participants, not Cooltsalon, is our biggest experiment in co-creation and co-authorship. The zine will be available on 12 May. Back in January 2022, we launched an Open Call for participation where the curator (Cooltsalon) became the creative contributor, and the co-creators (the confirmed participants) curated the content. We offered the participants 50 loose pieces – files of photos, illustrations, sketches – which they were to use as building blocks in their pages. Participants had the freedom to “remix” works, working with the source files but making alterations to them, putting multiple…

Not Another Online Event – Workshop Outcome

In such a heavily digitised world, why are digital events still not delivering to their full potential? Following Cooltsalon’s own practice in the field of hybrid and multiplatform events, this autumn we teamed up with Life Design Circle to deliver a one-day session further investigating the value and impact of online events today, to develop group ideas on how these could be more aligned with our wellbeing. Specifically, we were focusing on cultural-creative events. We wanted to engage with cultural events organisers and attendees alike, to find out why we “get lost in translation” when transferring offline experiences to online….

Open Call: Cooltsalon Facebook page takeover

Do you have an idea for an online project and/or content? Do you want our Facebook page to be your playground and a platform through which to present your ideas? We’re accepting proposals for curated Facebook content aka “Facebook page takeover”: managing Cooltsalon’s Facebook for 1 week, during which it could serve as your “gallery” for an online exhibition / a “diary” documenting some specific research/topic / or a communication channel for an interactive project, actively involving our followers through dialogue and/or game. Each “takeover” will last 1 week (Thursday-Wednesday) in August. Deadlines for proposals submission – 16:00 BST /…

cooltXchange weekend: screenings programme

A selection of works reflective of the “Future Now” theme will be screened during cooltXchange weekend (15-16 May 2021), available online on this dedicated page, and in-venue via location partners in Sofia, London and Belgrade (all in-venue screenings are subject to individual confirmations). Programme #1 “Future Now / Inherited Past” will be available on Saturday, 15 May only, and includes: The Future (2013) a playful stripped-down animation by award-winning Brighton-based filmmaker, Alex Goddard, telling you everything you need to know about the future in a couple of minutes. From There & No-Where Chronicles (2018) by Nice-based artist Jérémy Griffaud, a collection of…

Test new way of problem solving, sign up to Design Sprint

UPDATE: New dates! September 11 and 12. Those who have already signed-up for May will have their slots automatically reserved for the new dates – further communication via email will be provided. How to engage audiences online? How to test drive ideas and problem solve collectively? Anyone who somehow engages with cultural events, can feel the impact of this digital shift – whether you’ve been a guest to a virtual exhibition or had to move your festival to a VoD platform – and can put forward ideas about making these into more shared and collective experiences. We invite you to…

cooltXchange 15-16 May 2021

Programme links: https://linktr.ee/cooltzine  Downloadable programme schedules per location: Sofia , Belgrade , London Our fourth collaboratively created zine, Cooltzine, will be released on 15 May during the cooltXchange weekend (15-16 May) simultaneously in Sofia, Belgrade (co-curator Zeren Oruc, iksvyart) and London (co-curator Amy Jackson) The 2021 theme is “Future Now”. Pages are created by 24 contributors – from Indonesia to Bulgaria – participants in the Open Call announced December last year, and selected by Cooltsalon and invited international committee – Vasil Vladimirov (Be Duende, Bulgaria), Francesca Ricci (multidisciplinary visual artist and writer, Italy/Spain) and Zeren Oruc (iksvy art, Serbia/Turkey). Every…

Urban dwellers collective manifesto

UPDATE: Read the collective “Urban Dwellers Manifesto” here. Let’s imagine the future of our cities, together. What do our high streets look like? Parks? Work place? Do we walk more? What makes us happy? After a year like 2020, we felt that Cooltsalon’s motto #unitedwecreate really needs to come forward. It is what motivated us to open a call for written thoughts, ideas and suggestions, to produce a collective “manifesto” of what it means to be a city dweller, now and in the (foreseeable) future. At the core of our work is the desire to expand the notion of “creative”,…

Zine open call extended

The Open Call for co-creators of Cooltzine vol.4 have been extended until 14 December, 23:59 (GMT) The submissions process remains the same, with page proposals accepted via email (as outlined in the guidelines) It is important that you provide a short statement (50 words max) alongside your work, outlining how this relates to the zine’s theme, “Future Now”. In addition, we are now accepting text submissions from urban dwellers of all backgrounds. We are especially keen to hear from non-artists and those not directly employed in the creative-cultural sector, for feedback along any of the following: What do you think…

Cooltzine vol.4 Open Call

Cooltsalon invites submissions for the 4th collaboratively created zine, “Cooltzine”, where each page is done by different creatives, professional or amateur, as visual interpretation to the 2021 theme, “Future Now”. Where 2020 presented a collective challenge and posed shifts in the established models, rendering future planning both obsolete and even more necessary than before, we ask what does “going forward” mean now? Can one build while in a state of flux? Or is it a state of suspense and waiting, while the present is the only mode available?  To participate in the “Cooltzine vol.4: Future Now” Open Call, download the…

“The Invisible Enemy” exhibition

Cooltsalon is hosting Shahar Tuchner’s solo exhibition The Invisible Enemy, 27 June-10 July: right here, on our website. Initiated and curated by the artist himself, it’s a ‘viral’ project: appearing and populating different sites, emulating the coronavirus. The content will become ‘live’ on the homepage on Saturday, 27 June, 17:00 UTC. The exhibition consists of works from different years before the beginning of the Covid-19 epidemic, which are relevant to this period of social isolation and the new day-to-day behaviour that we all need to adopt and act upon, as well as new works created during this time. The artworks range in…