Overlapping worlds

Participation is open to all Iranians living abroad who identify, in any way, with exile.

We will meet outside National Gallery (WC2N 5DN), and walk towards UCL main campus.

Welcome to Walking Elsewhere, workshop series, exploring the relationship between bodies, public space and migration, by artist, urbanist, and researcher Dr Saba Zavarei.

Each workshop consists of toughly one hour of walking, followed by one hour of reflection and discussion at the UCL IAS centre in Euston. Sessions can be booked individually– there is no requirement to attend every workshop–though participants are warmly encouraged to join more than one, as each walk and workshop explores different routes and themes.

Please dress comfortably and bring your sense of adventure, you never know when London rain might join the walk!

The exercises draw on theatre and performance trainings, mind-mapping, counter- mapping, drift, and site-specific methods.

Week FIVE: Overlapping worlds

What does it mean to inhabit multiple places at once—mentally somewhere else while physically elsewhere—and how does this overlap shape our sense of presence, affect, and memory?

In this workshop we begin in Trafalgar Square, exploring the experience of being exiled while events unfold elsewhere. Whether following protests, personal losses, or other events remotely, we reflect on the feelings that arise from inhabiting multiple spaces at once: confusion, frustration, longing, or even liberation. Using observation, discussion, and reflective exercises, we examine how online media, news, and memory create overlapping geographies that shape our sense of being and belonging.