The Hologram: An Anti-Capitalist Care Practice That Anyone Can Use

The Hologram is an anti-capitalist, peer-to-peer mutual aid practice that has been developed and practiced by international collaborators since 2016, creating a revolutionary form of care that challenges traditional power structures and fosters deeper connections among participants. Cassie Thornton, social artist and the initial Hologram's instigator, will present her practice and strategies for collective transformation through social art.

This event is composed of a public lecture and a workshop (max. 16 people).

About the workshop:

This workshop offers "incomers" new to The Hologram practice a chance to learn about the history and reasoning behind it, as well as an opportunity to experiment with the method together. The practice, born from crisis and for crisis, puts together the processes of personal introspection, social cooperation, and strategic anti-capitalist organization.

The workshop takes 3 hours and is composed of ⅓ part presentation, ⅔ part participation led by 2 facilitators plus more people who are familiar with the practice, as needed. Everyone who joins us will be well supported, challenged, and invited to join the larger global Hologram community of practitioners.

About the speaker:

Cassie Thornton (b. 1981 US) is an artist and activist who makes a “safe space” for the unknown, for disobedience, and for unanticipated collectivity. She uses social practices including institutional critique, insurgent architecture, and “healing modalities” like hypnosis and yoga to find soft spots in the hard surfaces of capitalist life.

Cassie has invented a grassroots alternative credit reporting service for the survivors of gentrification, has hypnotized hedge fund managers, has finger-painted with the grime found inside banks, has donated cursed paintings to profiteering bankers, and has taught feminist economics to yogis (and vice versa).

Thornton is the initial “instigator” of The Hologram protocol. She has been teaching courses, growing the network, and supporting others who want to use the protocol for over three years now. Her book, The Hologram: Feminist, Peer-to-Peer Health for a Post-Pandemic Future, is available from Pluto Press. She is currently working at The Holographic School of Social Medicine in Berlin, writing about the long-term impacts of the Hologram practice, and connecting the project to other activist initiatives from across the world.