INTO ETERNITY: SENSING THE INFINITY OF THE MEDITERRANEAN through poetry
ONLINE LIVE WORKSHOP
Saturday, 24th May 2025 | 2h online live workshop
Europe, Asia and the Middle East — 5PM Hong Kong / 11AM Paris / 12PM Beirut
30€
+7 DAYS RECORDING ACCESS. Recording will expire on the 1st of June 2025
Bookings via Eventbrite
Refunds up to 5 days before event
Eventbrite's fee is nonrefundable
Tutored by Serene Debs and Iris Mir, co-creators of Medi.
Join us from across continents to embark on a journey into the infinity of our Mediterranean existence. This is a workshop where will create a space to carve permanence as a form of resistance into the world’s current wave of rampant change, hurry and impermanence. We’ll delve into the sensory experience of poetry as a medium to embrace slowness and to disrupt the dominant ways of perceiving our identities.
The session will mix moments of collective silence and creative action while we reflect about the concept of the ETERNAL الأبدية (al'abadia). We will engage in the practice of listening to a series of short poems from across the Mediterranean. After the reading of each poem, we’ll be guided into an artistic practice of self-expression.
At the end of the entire practice, there will be some space for collective reflection and exchange of ideas on how identity and culture are powerful tools to perpetuate and preserve the Mediterranean heritage through eternity.
Our experimentation with the concept of ETERNAL الأبدية will lead us to a disruptive collective experiment to unearth the unheard of and the unsaid about the hopeful futures and interdependent networks of care and inquiry preserved in the Mediterranean.
ABOUT THE TUTORS:
Serene Debs is a Syrian artist and educator from Damascus, now based in Hong Kong. Given her Fine Arts degree, she works as an art instructor with practice in various materials. Debs also works as a news agency stringer, while leading her own collective to showcase Levantine culture through art in Hong Kong. With her experience in organizing art workshops and creative events that celebrate cultural representation, she aims to foster meaningful conversations and explore the richness of the Mediterranean region, through various mediums of expression.
Iris Mir is a Spanish storyteller, photographer, educator and movement instructor from Costa Brava. Before establishing her current base in Tenerife, the Canary Islands, she worked in Beijing, Hong Kong, London and Barcelona. Identity, culture, traditions and the life by the sea of the communities in Asia, the Mediterranean and the Atlantic are the focus of her projects. Mir also organizes workshops and retreats on photography, journaling, creative writing and yoga to inspire to protect the ocean and the natural world. With her experience working cross-culturally with local communities, she aims to create a space where all the peoples from the Mediterranean have a space to use their own-voices and co-create alternative futures.
FAQs and how to get ready for the session - Please read these thoroughly.
If you have any questions, get in touch with us
WHO IS THIS FOR:
This workshop is suitable for EVERYONE. There is no such thing as ‘levels’ in our sessions. Everyone is welcome. No previous artistic experience is required.
Medi is an open space built upon respect and community where all participants can find a space to express their most intimate and hopeful visions for the future. We ask you to bring this spirit of respect with you to all our sessions.
YOU WILL NEED:
A pen - black or blue (your color of choice)
White paper sheets - A4
Color pencils - a color set of more or less 12 colours
Pencil sharpener
ONCE BOOKED:
You will receive a confirmation email and details on how to join the event.
You will receive an email with a Zoom link to join the event within 24-48 h after your purchase. You will also receive an email reminder ahead of the event.
DURING THE WORKSHOP:
We’ll spend an afternoon together re-imagining our relationship with the Mediterranean while nurturing our wellbeing and creating new pathways for a more hopeful future, where care and diversity take on a central stage in our communities.
The workshop will be structured as an alternating flow of poetry reading and artistic/creative practice. During each poetry reading, attendees are invited to take notes, sketches or simply listen in silence and stillness. After the reading, we’ll take action as we are guided into a process of self-expression to artistically engage with the poems and our hopes for an eternal Mediterranean identity.
We’ll intimately gather for 2 hours in a small live group over Zoom to give people the opportunity to join from anywhere in the world. The main language of this online retreat will be English. Some support will be offered in Arabic and Spanish, in case it is needed for clarifications. You can use any language of your choice for your creations during the workshop.
Because our workshops are being recorded and made available to participants for a few days after the session, by registering and joining this workshop you are agreeing to the meeting being recorded and shared with all participants.
AFTER THE WORKSHOP:
We’d love to see your creations! You can share them with us and the Medi community by tagging us on instagram @inthemedi
IF YOU ENCOUNTER ANY ISSUES WHEN BOOKING OR IF YOU HAVE ANY FURTHER QUESTIONS PLEASE EMAIL US
We're really looking forward to creating with you!
Love,
Serene & Iris
WHAT’S MEDI
Medi takes the shape of guided collaborative artistic and creative workshops that aim to create a language of possibility to come up with counter stories, remember collective histories, explore shared pathways and imagine speculative futures that reinforce the role of the Mediterranean as a place for life.
With this effort, Serene Debs and Iris Mir are joining their creative forces and experiences to hold regular online workshops and one-of-a-kind in person pop-ups around the world to bring together people from across continents to use their imagination, artistic instincts, languages and cultural identities to reflect on the diversity of the Mediterranean and the region’s collective histories.
Serene Deb’s artwork