26 August 2025 | Mind Space Berlin

At People, Planet, Pint, a sustainability meet-up, around 40–50 people got together to talk sustainability and to look under the hood of Drishya Kala Klima, an initiative nby Sanyam Bajaj. Beside the stage, a Climate Clock counted down as I spoke: a quiet metronome for urgency and an anchor for the work’s core question, how do arts help us #ActInTime?

Instead of only showing the artwork, I pulled back the curtain on how they’re curated. I walked through the workflow behind my montages: field walks and conversations → contact sheets and annotations → pairing images with archival fragments and policy language → building visual counterpoints (what sits inside/beside the frame) → and finally, sequencing pieces against time cues from the Clock. I spoke about historical context (from early climate warnings to today’s policy realities), about ethics (consent, captioning, what we choose not to show), and about methods I use—photo-elicitation to surface memory, montage to hold contradictions, and participatory prompts to translate feeling into intent.

We then split into four rotating circles—NGOs, Academia, Creatives, Business—with three prompts:

1. If you were an artist, what would your art be about?

2. How does art shape culture, politics, and climate conversations?

3. Where has art shifted a public conversation—examples?

The best part was the friction: some remained unconvinced that art can transform societies or nudge human-centric policy. At the same time, others admitted the Climate Clock unsettled them, the steady countdown translated abstract timelines into a pulse you could feel. Holding both responses matters: skepticism keeps the work honest; fear makes it urgent. Between them lies the line between aesthetics and action.

Gratitude to Mindspace Krausenstraße for hosting and to the PPP community including Jessica, Alessia and Meghan for the “no pitches, no panels—just people” format. Onward, more images, more questions, more shared work. Join the next circle. #ActInTime

Picture Credits/ Hannah Hotz