Opening for Biophilia showcase, 5 October 2016

I had the great honour and pleasure of moderating the showcasing for Biophilia Educational Project. This is my opening address:

Introduction for Biophilia Showcase

Heaven

Heaven‘s bodies

whirl around me

Make me wonder

The refrain in the epic motherapp of Biophilia, Cosmogony, seems to me to capture the essence of the human spirit. The spirit of curiosity, restlessness and joyful passion for understanding, or trying to understand, the world and ourselves. That this magnificent work of art by Björk formed the spark for an ambitious, dynamic and inspiring educational project seems in hindsight to be almost inevitable.

The first model of the Educational project was developed in 2011 at Björk’s Biophilia concerts/residency in Iceland. It was originally conceived by Björk, Reykjavík City Schools and the University of Iceland. In 2014 the Icelandic Ministry of Education, Science and Culture made the Biophilia Educational Project one of its main projects during Iceland´s Presidency in the Nordic Council and this is why we are all here today. This project has been large and complex in scope, involving 33 schools, 147 teachers and 3454 students in the Five Nordic Countries, the Faroe Islands, Greenland and Aaland.

Biophilia encourages creative and critiial thought and action for students and their teachers, employing technology in creative and innovative ways. Biophilic work is interdisciplinary, playful and exciting – where the main fields are always science and music, but with detours into visual art, psychology, drama and countless other domains.

The project’s execution has been reviewed by Attentus, and in their preliminary report it comes through that almost all participants in the focus groups reported that sharing experiences through meetings both within their workplaces and countries was very important and it was interesting and inspiring to hear what other people were doing – and today we will get excellent opportunities for sharing across borders!

On a personal note, it has been a great honour to participate in a small way in this project and I am utterly thrilled to be here with you today.  Working on the texts that come with the songapps was a challenge and a pleasure. It is wonderful to get one’s educational convictions strengthened and to be  inspired to become a more creative, critical and biophilic teacher.

So, lets start the show!