September 1–9, 2026, Split, Brač, Hvar, Vis
An island pedagogy across the southern Dalmatian archipelago marking the centenary of Ivan Illich’s birth
With Hito Steyerl, Jürgen Renn, Claire Pentecost, Sarah Lewison, Sara Black, Yvonne Illich, Srećko Horvat, !Mediengruppe Bitnik, Damir Ugljen, Armina Pilav, Jamie Allen, Valeria Graziano, Gordan Savičić, Felix Stalder, Morana Miljanović, Manja Ristić, Saša Savanović, Kevin Kenjar, Laura Lotti, Predrag Kolaković, Ivica Mitrović, Bronwyn Lay, Dora Vanette, Aleksandra Sekulić, Dennis Schep, Luís Brum, Mariana Pestana, Helin Ulas, Marianna Tsionki, Cassie Thornton, John W. Kim, the Anthropocene Commons network, and probably a few others...
Islands as a way of life, as a way of learning.
In early autumn 2026, a small research procession departs from Split, the ancient Roman coastal city, and crosses the seas between Brač, Hvar, and Vis: three islands that each, in their own way, host ways of living away from the mainland. We eventually arrive on Vis, an insular territory with a deep history of refuge and autonomous actions.
We travel together also to explore the legacy of Ivan Illich (born September 4th 1926), a Croatian-Austrian thinker who, through his best-known writings—Medical Nemesis, Deschooling Society, Tools for Conviviality—posed generative challenges to the industrial-modern institutions that still presume themselves to be ‘indispensable.’ Illich insisted on environmental health, offered a vocabulary for institutional alterity, and emphasised the importance of technology as convivial tools rather than as deterministic fate. Illich’s concept of “conviviality” denotes tools and institutions that serve people, not the other way around, thus strengthening their autonomy, mutuality, and ability to cooperate freely.