Reading Your Collective Activism

Many self-organising activist communities face significant challenges in sustaining collective efforts for social transformation within a system that lacks structural support. Alchemy of Commons (2022- ongoing) is a multi-year research project that examines the complex dynamics within change-making collective bodies, regardless of their institutional status. Unlike many organisational tools that focus on boosting efficiency and productivity, our project emphasises the activist nature and the sustained need for warmth and comfort, attention, and support of those communities, covering a wider range of considerations such as the practice of solidarity and the transformation of individuals and society.

Continuing the form of an interactive lecture that we did in last year’s 2d.H5 festival, we would like to share new insights we gained in 2025. Particularity, we will introduce the interdynamics between the Latent aspects (Relationships, Economy and Healing) and the Manifestive aspects (Space, Labour and Ideology) in a community, and invite the audience to share their experience in their collective.

Alongside the updates, we are excited to launch the
Entry Guide for Cosmogram of Community (previously named ‘Ontology of Community’), a small zine that puts together the most essential insights from our research. Whether you are coming from a collective, running a community space, or supporting communities with all sorts of means, this zine offers you a framework to reflect on the cosmology of your community. With it, you can check in on the current status of the community, identify the strengths and possible blockages, or simply gain knowledge and insights about community dynamics. In this version, we would like to provide an initiation, a tryout, and a reflection, starting from the self and informed by the same intentions and theories as our extensive workshops.