Sunsets and Sunrises: Lost Futures and Emerging Hopes

Sunsets and Sunrises: Lost Futures and Emerging Hopes is a participatory visualisation project that gives people space to engage with emotions around imagined futures that are disappearing (and appearing), as part of the phase-out and breakdown of systems, structures, and practices. 

Both a collaborative art piece—so far run with more than 100+ participants in the Netherlands, Norway, and Italy—and a  research probe into imaginaries of climate futures, Sunsets and Sunrises uses creative materials to prompt participants to share ideas and emotions of imagined futures that they have perhaps had to let go (‘sunsets’), or which they realise are disappearing, both personally and at a larger scale—whether as part of transitions to a more sustainable society or exactly because of the current state of the world. But we also explore  (‘sunrises’): futures that might be on their way, already effective (and affective) in our presents, bringing hope for better worlds and ways to live.

We suggest that this form of collaborative imagination practice could be an important component of societal engagement with climate crisis. Collectively sharing our sunsets creates a collaborative memorial, but also (via our sunrises) a shared witnessing of the emergence of hope for new possibilities.

Sunsets and Sunrises was initially developed as part of IMAGINE: Contested Futures of Sustainability, an interdisciplinary research project across humanities, social sciences, design, and arts, bringing together researchers from Norway, the Netherlands and the UK, funded by the Research Council of Norway.

Exhibitions

2025. Lockton, D. and Coops. F. ‘Sunsets & Sunrises: Climate change and transition through the lens of lost futures’ in Our Critical Decade for Climate Action, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, Norwich, September 2025 (see poster)

2025. Coops, F. and Lockton, D. ‘Sunsets and Sunrises: Lost Futures and Emerging Hopes’ in The Futures We Imagine, Nitja Centre for Contemporary Art, Lillestrøm, Norway, January–February 2025

2024. Coops, F. and Lockton, D. ‘Sunsets and Sunrises: Lost Futures and Emerging Hopes’ in The Futures We Imagine, Litteraturhuset, Oslo, Norway, December 2024