We contemplate different ways of experiencing time beyond the linear, with Somerset House Studios artist Shenece Oretha on transforming time through the practice of listening, sociologist Judy Wajcman on unpicking progress from speed in the digital sphere and psychologist Dr Ruth Ogden on how our experience of time is relational and whether it’s possible to conceive of ‘free time’ in a modern world.

In March 2020, the non-stop nature of our 24/7 world came to a stop. For many in the Western world, it allowed us a space to reconsider the way we value our time and with that our relationship to work. Now, amidst the strikes and the resignations, a new movement  is emerging called ‘Soft Life’. which seeks to sidestep the values of hustle culture for slowness and ease.  How can softness open up new ways of being in the world and create different types of value? Could it be a way of healing our relationship with the natural world at a point of crisis? 

In this four-part series we take the idea of ‘soft life’ as a launch off point to explore alternative ideas around work, time, the body and ecology emanating from Somerset House and beyond. We talk to radical thinkers, artists and writers, who are carving out these new ways of being in the body, centring the soft and the in-between, finding space for rest and looking at ways of expanding time beyond the clock.

This episode includes the following sound works by Shenece Oretha:

Conspiracy

Listening Wholes

at/Tribute

Ah So It Go, Ah No So it Go, Go So!

Who Can’t Hear Must Feel