The cultural association for popular education, TEC CRIAC (Travail et Culture), in partnership with Iméra, invites you to an event to examine the changing nature of work at the intersection of artistic practices and the social sciences, and to explore contemporary and future visions of work.
8th Meeting – Culture; Arts/Labour and Utopias
Labour now plays a central role in our societies, whilst undergoing profound changes. Amidst organisational transformations, technological advances and shifts in social relations, it is becoming a source of tension, but also of reinvention.
In this context, artistic creations (film, dance, theatre, contemporary arts), in dialogue with the social sciences, offer sensitive and critical ways of understanding these transformations. They enable us to see, feel and think about work in a different way.
Through dialogue with the social sciences, they help to reshape our perceptions and open up the possibility of imagining new forms of organisation, cooperation and meaning.
How can the arts and social sciences help to bring about contemporary utopian visions of labour? How can they transform our sensory experiences and our collective narratives of labour?
This event aims to explore these issues through various artistic disciplines in dialogue with the social sciences, viewed as different avenues for reflecting on the world of labour today and in the future.
- 9.30 am | Welcome coffee
- 10.00 am | Introduction: How can artistic representations and the social sciences help us to rethink and bring to life new utopias of labour?
- Introduction, overarching theme and conclusion:
- Enrico Donaggio, philosopher and scientific director of Iméra;
- Michel Lallement, sociologist;
- José Rose, sociologist.
- Introduction, overarching theme and conclusion:
- 11.30 am | Round-table discussion: Portraying labour: perspectives from cinema
This round-table discussion will explore how cinema helps to examine the changing nature of labour, whilst opening up new ways of imagining and new meanings.- Speakers:
- Sébastien Jousse, director;
- Frédérique Debout, philosopher and senior lecturer in psychopathology and psychodynamics of work at the CNAM.
- Speakers:
- 1.00 pm | Lunch break
- 2.30 pm | Round-table discussion: Dance as a resource for reflecting on the reality of labour
This round-table discussion will explore how dance can serve as a tool for understanding and transforming labour, and how it can inspire alternative forms of organisation, cooperation and our relationship with the body.- Speakers:
- Carole Baudin, ethnologist, engineer and photographer;
- Alejandro Russo, choreographer and dancer.
- Speakers:
- 4.00 pm | Round-table discussion: Contemporary arts and labour: hybridisations, tensions, critiques
Contemporary art provides a space for experimentation in which representations of labour are redefined, at the intersection of aesthetic, social and economic dimensions. Oscillating between critique and the reproduction of capitalist logic, they question their own position as well as their capacity to propose ways of distancing themselves from and reconfiguring the imaginaries of work.
Can contemporary art be seen as a laboratory for the future of labour?- Speakers:
- Mathilde Chenin, artist and PhD in sociology;
- Emmanuel Tibloux, Director of the École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs
- Speakers:
- 5.30 pm | Conclusion
- 6.30 pm | Performance on ‘labour’ by Alejandro Russo, La Malagua theatre company
- 7.30 pm | Cocktail reception.
This event is organised by TEC CRIAC (Travail et Culture), in partnership with Iméra and with the support of the Ministry of Culture.
Practical information
- Date: Friday, November 6th, 2026, from 9.30 am to 7.30 pm
- Venue: Iméra, 2 Place Leverrier, 13004 Marseille
- Registration is required for this event .
- Free admission, subject to registration: 03 20 89 40 60 / info@travailetculture.org
Coming to Iméra
- Pedestrian access: please go to the gate at 2 Place Leverrier, 13004 Marseille.
- Access for people with reduced mobility: entrance viaAllée Jean-Louis Pons, 13004 Marseille.
Please use the pedestrian entrance at 2 Place Leverrier.
