"Studies for a Potential History", June 2026

CAPIm’s Summer School gathers artists, curators and artistic researchers annualy to consider the relationship between art and the political imaginary through a thematic lens. This year, we take SHED’s publishing catalogue as a point of departure and engage with Ariella Aïsha Azoulay’s notion of potential history to think collectively about how unlearning imperialism might unfold within artistic research. Our focus on Marseille is not incidental: as a port city shaped by migration, extraction, and empire, it occupies a pivotal place in the ongoing potential history of decoloniality. To read Marseille through Azoulay’s lens is to refuse the closure of the colonial archive and to open a space in which artistic practice contributes to the repair and re-imagining of shared worlds.

The Summer School unfolds over nine days and will encompass participant presentations, collective food preparation, close reading sessions, intensive workshops with invited artists and theorists—including Ariella Aïsha Azoulay—and an evening program open to the public in Marseille curated by Arthur Eskenazi. All events will take place on-site in manner responsive to local conditions and the possibility of intense summer heat. 

Though CAPIm is insitutionally located in Sweden, the Summer School with its faculty and participants, is hosted in Marseille by local structures and cultural organizers, including Artagon Marseille and SHED Publishing, among others. To be guests in a contigent structure is fundamental to the imagination of the Summer School.

Call for participants

The Summer School is open to artistic researchers from any discipline, students and doctoral candidates in the fields of art or artistic research; and artists, architects or cultural workers with a demonstrated investment in the political imaginary as an emancipatory practice. The core program will be capped at fourteen participants, but a series of events in the evening will be open to the public on-site. It is not possible to join any part of the program online. 

During the Summer School, participants are required to be present in Marseille for the entire period and attend an average of six hours per day of core programming. An elective schedule based on participants initiative and faculty propositions will be organized and evolve out of collective discussions.

Participants are also asked to undertake preliminary reading in advance and required to attend an online introductory session on the context of Marseille and the logistical planning for the Summer School in late May 2026.

The program is free and will be delivered in English. Travel to and from Marseille, accommodation in collective rented apartments, mid-day meals, and workshop materials are covered by the Summer School. Insurance, visa fees, on site ground transport, morning and evening meals are the responsibility of each participant.

Application Proceedure

Selection is based on a statement of intention outlining why you wish to take part in the Summer School and what investment your practice demonstrates in the idea of the political imaginary, defined as you would like (800 words max). There is also the possibility to use links to websites and/or social media in the application.

Application deadline is January 10, 2026, at 23:59:59 Central European Time (CET). Apply here.

Applicants may be called for an interview on February 3 and 4, 2026. Please keep these dates in mind when you apply. Final decisions will be made before February 15. 

Conditions for participation

Participation is free, with travel and accommodation covered by CAPIm.
No ECTS credits will be awarded.