Art laboratory platforms with various visions, approaches, formats, and target participants are increasingly prevalent in our contemporary art scene today. Although emphasizing the importance of the creation process, it does not mean that this kind of platform does not pay attention to the results. It’s just that what is referred to as “results” is interpreted more subtly and fluidly in the sense that “results” are not only works of art, but dialogue, exchange, and mutual support systems are also perceived as values. The art laboratory platform also enables a collective process in which organizers and participants fuse to try out ways of working, review each other’s perspectives and comfort zones, question art systems, and offer transformative and meaningful prepositions of art practice for specific contexts.

The above notes have driven Kampana – IDF Academy and Invisible Dance, the Goethe Institut India and Indonesia project to open a conversation about process-based art laboratory practices. In this conversation, the speaker will exchange their experiences of the art laboratory practice before reflecting on the dynamics of the arts and social fields encountered in Indonesia, regional and international. In addition, this conversation will also open a space to think together about how dance can be or has become a vehicle for social change, connecting with local communities and engaging in alternative international networks. How does this process based laboratory platform work in art discourse? How does this approach to the laboratory generate a variety of its practical methods? How does it affect the artistic and aesthetic realm? What is the political potential of this platform in the social and political economy? What positions and roles can be taken by the institutions providing the art laboratory platform, the relation of boxes to diverse perspectives, value setting powers, and other interests? Which voices and perspectives are present in the collaboration, which are not, and why is that? How do collaboration participants take a closer look at practices from within the performing arts that have produced significant transformations in local communities and contexts and provide insight into their recent projects? To what extent do laboratory practices affect the growth of the surrounding communal and collective ecosystems? How far does laboratory practice affect infrastructure access in the social and political economy that takes place in the surrounding community? To what extent does collaborative work in laboratory practice allow for the establishment of new alliances or networks, both locally and globally/internationally? How can the alliance move the dance beyond the realm of the familiar and explore unexpected relationships in an uncertain future?