SWISP
SWISP Lab is an interdisciplinary critical futures living lab and speculative thinking consultancy based in Narrm, Melbourne.
SWISP (Speculative Wanderings in Space and Place) Lab led by Kate and Sacha is an a/r/tographic living lab in Naarm (Melbourne, Australia) working in the fields of speculative a/r/tography, digital creativities, digital childhoods, digital methods, digital education, and digital scholarships in the humanities, arts and social sciences.
A living lab refers to a relational real-world environment that is used for applied practice, testing, and speculative play. It allows researchers, teachers and practitioners to study, test, and speculate on possible, preferable and plausible solutions in realistic conditions rather than in controlled settings. There is a strong emphasis on co-creation, feedback loops and data creativities that involve end-users in the design, development, and evaluation processes to ensure that solutions are relevant and effective. Our post-digital living lab involves collaboration with various stakeholders, such as researchers, industry, teachers, and end-users (in our case young people), to address complex challenges.
SWISP seeks to speculate as a/r/tographers about reparative futures in the midst of climate collapse. We entangle our research pathways in this collective to pose questions, break, disrupt and wander with/in multigenerational connected communities. Our work seeks to move in and out, over and under, through and within spaces and places while knitting together disparate cites/sites/sights in a metagalaxy of ideas, wonderings and speculations. ORCID LinkedIn Instagram
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Tipping Point Stories from COP30
Within SWISP Lab’s Hacking the Anthropocene living lab methodology, the “At what point did you realise…?” prompt operates as more than a conversational opening. It is a methodological device that surfaces moments of recognition, rupture, and recalibration. The question directs attention toward critical thresholds: points in ecological, political, and affective systems where conditions shift irreversibly […]
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New Publications for 2025
Edited book Coleman, K., Cook, P. J., Healy, S., & MacDonald, A. (Eds.). (2025). Learning Through Art: Speculative Pasts and Pedagogical Imaginaries. InSEA. https://doi.org/10.24981/2025-LTASPPI Book chapters Coleman, K., Cook, P. J., Healy, S., & MacDonald, A. (2025). Position/ing – imaginary menagerie: Speculative a/r/tographies for the long now. In K. Coleman, P. J. Cook, S. Healy, […]
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#blogtakeover I Filippa Kier Droob I Stitching Together Practice and Theory: Tracing My First Encounter with A/r/tography
What is an a/r/tographer? Had you asked me this question a couple of weeks ago, my answer would have been a pretty solid, “I couldn’t tell you.” Though now, almost four weeks into my three-month stay as a visiting scholar at the Faculty of Education at the University of Melbourne,my answer might be, “Me?”. Becoming […]
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SWISP goes to Bohemia!
SWISP Lab represented by Yvette Walker, Anna Farago, Sarah Healy (in-person), Kathryn Coleman (virtually) Image Caption: Sarah Healy, Yvette Walker, Anna Farago (in-person), Kathryn Coleman (virtually) In the middle of the year a highlight for SWSIP Lab was heading to the InSEA World Congress in Olomouc, Czech Republic. SWISP Lab was busy presenting individual work […]
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From HAK.io to Imperfect Games: Finding Structure in Speculative Play #blogtakeover
Ben Axnick, Natasha Baldock, Alan Chen, Mengni Li, Jade Rui Hi, we are Ben, Natasha, Alan, Jade, and Monnie. We are students in the Master of Teaching (Early Childhood, Primary and Secondary). We spent the last two weeks in SWISP Lab to explore the collision of arts and science. From this blog, you will know about […]
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Art Meets Science in a Time of Climate Collapse
Is it radical to have an arts-based educational research lab inside a science gallery? Maybe. But perhaps what’s truly radical is that we’re still surprised by it! Launch of the lab at Science Gallery Melbourne, opening night with Dr Ryan Jefferies, Director, Science Gallery Melbourne and Dr Kate Coleman, SWISP Lab. Image credit: Gregory Lorenzutti […]
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SWISP Lab goes to AUS-MUN India x JPGS
University of Melbourne at AUSMUN 2025 | Jaipur, India Three extraordinary days, one unforgettable collaboration for SWISP (Associate Professor Kathryn Coleman and Dr Sarah Healy, co-leads) Lab representing the University of Melbourne alongside Vandita Bhargava, Country Manager at the University of Melbourne Delhi Centre, and Dr Jeff Garmany, Associate Professor in Latin American Studies, School of […]
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Why We’re in Distraction: SWISP Lab at Science Gallery Melbourne
Join us to hack DISTRACTION.Play the game.Share your story.Remix data.Design futures.For the planet. Tonight, Distraction opens at Science Gallery Melbourne and with it, SWISP Lab begins a living lab residency unlike any other. For those of you who’ve traveled with us before, you’ll know SWISP as a space of speculative wanderings, where wonder and wickedness, […]
Who is SWISP?
Associate Professor Kate Coleman
Kate is co-lead of SWISP with Dr Sacha Healy and CI on ‘The Learning with the Land’, SSHRC project in the Faculty of Education. Her pluridisciplinary research and teaching are positioned in the intersection of art, design, digital, practice, culture, and data. Kate’s research into practice includes digital practices and immersive data sites, creativities, speculative inquiry, and data creation with young people living in the midst of climate collapse. ORCID
Sacha is co-lead of SWISP with Dr Kate Coleman. They research and teach in studioFive at the Faculty of Education, The University of Melbourne. Best known for their contributions to the fields of critical affect studies, digital methods and the posthumanities, Sacha’s interdisciplinary program of research involves research collaborations with academics, artists, practitioners and educators from around the world. ORCID
INTERNATIONAL PARTNERSHIPS
The social practice component of SWISP Lab’s program of research is made possible through international partnerships. A key collaborator is the Science Gallery International Network. Science Gallery Bengaluru is a major contributor to this collaboration. An aim of SWISP Lab is to form connections with organisations in India that share Science Gallery Bengaluru’s mission and values and would like to explore how an international partnership with an Australia research team could be beneficial. The following 38 minute video, “International partnerships in Anthropogenic times: Engaging in creative inquiry” features critical reflections on the complexities of India-Australia partnerships by SWISP Lab, Science Gallery Bengaluru and the Council for Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW).
PARTNERS AND COLLABORATORS
Science Gallery Network | The Science Gallery Network consists of leading universities united around a singular mission: to ignite creativity and discovery where science and art collide. The galleries of the Science Gallery Network are committed to bringing science, art, technology and design together to deliver world-class educational and cultural experiences for young people.
Associate Professor Eri Saikawa | Emory Climate Talks | ORCID | Eri conducts interdisciplinary research on the environment. Eri has worked on diverse projects that cover: 1) atmospheric chemistry (modelling aerosols and tropospheric ozone); 2) environmental health (assessing the adverse health impacts of air pollution); 3) biogeochemistry (modelling global soil nitrous oxide emissions); 4) climate science (estimating emissions of non-CO2 greenhouse gases), and 5) environmental policy/politics (analyzing the impacts of environmental standards and trade as well as analysing policymaking processes).
Council on Energy, Environment and Water | CEEW is one of Asia’s leading not-for-profit policy research institutions. CEEW uses data, integrated analysis, and strategic outreach to explain – and change – the use, reuse, and misuse of resources.
Global Childhoods Research Hub | Faculty of Education, University of Melbourne | The GCRH position’s children’s lives, worldviews and futures at its core. It connects childhood research and teaching in a clear and cohesive manner, bringing projects from leading academics, early career-researchers, research fellows and doctoral students together around interdisciplinary themes and research problems; including those related to equity, social justice and disadvantage, climate change and sustainability, contemporary learning ecologies, multimodal lives, education systems and children as activists. The focus of Global Childhoods Research Hub is on the lives and experiences of children from birth to 18 years of age across the world.
What does a (s)wisp do in Minecraft? A wisp, when found, circles around a wall with a interactable brick. It disappears quickly after touching the hero. When clicked, the wall opens up and reveals a hidden room that occasionally contains six emerald pots, a common chest, or an obsidian chest.
SWISP acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the stolen land on which we practice, research, teach and learn. We offer respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Elders, past and present. In the spirit of reconciliation we acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and their continuing connections to land, sea, sky and community. What Country are you on? Native Digital Land might help you locate it.