The Polemocene – Humanity’s War with the Forest
| Reference number | |
| Coordinator | RISE Research Institutes of Sweden AB - RISE |
| Funding from Vinnova | SEK 698 487 |
| Project duration | March 2025 - June 2025 |
| Status | Completed |
| Venture | Call for proposals within Hållbara Värdekedjor |
| Call | Future prototypes for a sustainable forest value chain |
Important results from the project
The project "The Polemocene – The Human-Forest War" fulfilled its objective to result in an interactive exhibition with different components that gives visitors a fictional role as expert observers of a speculative future where the forest and humankind are in open conflict. Both the exhibition itself, and the work to produce it, created reflections, discussions and opportunities for new ways of approaching questions about present and future forest value chains and human-forest relationships.
Expected long term effects
Through the project process, both project participants and the reference group have strengthened various capacities and developed various competencies, especially in foresight and speculative design, and have opened up to new perspectives and potential collaborations and opportunities. The resulting exhibition of the project gave rise to many conversations and reflections, and several of the project´s parts have and will be disseminated beyond the project´s limitations in time and space.
Approach and implementation
To activate the project as much as possible with short notice, many meetings in several editions of each were held with the reference group. The first phase of foresight was more extensive than later phases of design and prototyping, but it gave a good foundation and created good conversations, reflections and contacts in the group. The reference group requested more physical meetings than were possible in the hectic period April-June, which perhaps affected the prototyping phase the most.