From the Edges to the Center

Renzo Martens is a Dutch artist and filmmaker, born in 1973, known for provocative work about representation, power, and the economics of art. His practice often places himself inside the work to expose uncomfortable roles played by artists, media, and spectators. He also uses documentary film and long-term institutional projects to challenge colonial and capitalist structures.
In 2010, he founded the Institute for Human Activities (IHA), a project centered on art, land, and social change in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He has collaborated with plantation workers through CATPC (Cercle d’Art des Travailleurs de Plantation Congolaise, a cooperative of Congolese plantation workers and artists) , linking contemporary art to land reclamation and community economics. Martens’s work has been shown internationally, including at major biennials and museum exhibitions, and has also been involved in the Yale World Fellow program.

Shikiba is a journalist, ethnologist, and author focusing on Afghanistan, women’s rights, geopolitics, media, and social change. For more than two decades, she has worked on political and social developments in Afghanistan, combining journalistic practice with ethnological perspectives and international media work. Her work focuses particularly on the lived realities, rights, and agency of Afghan women in the context of political transformation and international power structures. She is the author of “Die Afghaninnen – Spielball der Politik”, which will be published internationally in English as “Afghan Women – Pawns in Political Power Struggles“.

Shikiba has also worked extensively in journalism training in Afghanistan and produced a documentary for ARTE on Bacha Posh, girls who temporarily live as boys in order to bypass social restrictions.

Nat is the author of Ricardo’s Dream: How Economists Forgot the Real World and Led Us Astray. A Fellow of the Schumacher Institute and the Royal Society of Arts (RSA), Nat previously worked for the award-winning NGO Global Witness as an anti-corruption investigator and campaign leader for the Democratic Republic of Congo team . His stories have been reported on by Channel 4 News, the BBC and the New York Times among others and have sparked government investigations and sanctions in the US, Canada and Congo. He has also worked for Rainforest Foundation UK and IIED and for Promoting Economic Pluralism (PEP). He’s lived and worked in France and West Africa and has a degree in history and a masters in international politics.

He has a deep interest in the history of ideas, especially in the interplay of ideas between physics, the natural world, the social sciences, and literature.

Melanie is CEO/Co-founder of Radically Open Security (the world’s first not-for-profit computer security company), and “Post Growth” startup incubator Nonprofit Ventures. She is also a former Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the Free University of Amsterdam.

She was named “Most Innovative IT Leader of the Netherlands” by CIO Magazine (TIM Award) in 2017, and one of the “9 Most Innovative Women in the European Union” (EU Women Innovators Prize) in 2019. She is also one of the 400 most successful women in the Netherlands by Viva Magazine (Viva400) in 2010 and 2017, and one of the fifty most inspiring women in tech (Inspiring Fifty Netherlands) in 2016, 2017, and 2019. Her company, Radically Open Security was named the 50th Most Innovative SME by the Dutch Chamber of Commerce (MKB Innovatie Top 100) in 2016.

Ron is a multidisciplinary artist, musician, director, sound healer, and life coach whose work beautifully integrates creativity, healing, and personal development. Emerging from the cultural revolution and consciousness explorations of 1960s New York, his path has woven through decades of directing the dance theater company Cloud Chamber, deep somatic exploration, and process-oriented psychology. By blending artistic expression with mindfulness, body-centered awareness, and breathwork, Ron helps individuals and communities step past cognitive noise and into deep embodiment, creative freedom, and authentic presence.

Katrin is an engineer, a true social entrepreneur, and one of the most outspoken voices in the African energy sector challenging the conventional narrative of “helping” Africa through aid and carbon finance. Her work questions the fundamental assumptions behind Western aid, arguing that the issue has never been a lack of solutions, but a failure of systems. In her view, the woman cooking over firewood is not a charity case—she is an entrepreneur waiting for the right conditions, not the right donor.

For over 15 years, she has built (B)energy, an entirely aid-free biogas business across Africa, working through local entrepreneurs and distributors. She has witnessed African founders break under the weight of ecosystems that were never designed for them to succeed. Before testing a single idea, they are already paying a price: building infrastructure that should exist, shaping regulation that should protect them, and training talent that should be available. Meanwhile, well-intended interventions—subsidies, free technologies, and carbon-driven projects—are presented as solutions, yet often reinforce the very problems they aim to solve. They distort markets, undermine local businesses, and ultimately slow down or even prevent economic development.

Today, Katrin is developing ccCASH, a new approach to one of Africa’s biggest poverty traps: traditional cooking. Instead of subsidizing technologies, ccCASH focuses on unlocking the real economic value of the transition to clean cooking at the household level. It reframes this transition as a major opportunity to address climate change and poverty—by turning people themselves into paid actors.

Olga is a psychologist and trauma therapist with a deep passion for the human soul. With over 15 years of experience in guiding individuals through deep transformation she blends a rich spectrum of psychotherapeutic approaches with deep inner work and regression practices in equal respect to mind, body, heart and spirit. Deeply believing that each one of us has inside all potential for healing, change, evolution and growth she opens the path for deep healing, reconnection of scattered parts and remembering your own true essence and qualities, all those forgotten in your day life and to awaken them alive back into your life.

Eda is an internationally recognised visual and multimodal anthropologist and is the founder of EthnoKino Film Festival and KarmaMotion with whom she filmed and produced numerous award winning documentary films.

She is an SNSF postdoctoral researcher at the Wyss Academy for Nature at the University of Bern working on equitable biodiversity governance and just conservation across the world (www.bridging-values.com).

Thomas is an independent  journalist, writer, translator and socialist. He is the co-director of Standing Army (2010), an award-winning feature-length documentary on US military bases featuring Gore Vidal and Noam Chomsky; and the author of several books, including: The Battle for Europe: How an Elite Hijacked a Continent – and How We Can Take It Back (Pluto Press, 2014); Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World (Pluto Press, 2017); and The Covid Consensus: The Global Assault on Democracy and the Poor—A Critique from the Left (Hurst, 2023).

He is a columnist for UnHerd and Compact bringing in pluralist, counter-neoliberal and pragmatic perspectives to political topics.

Laura is the CEO of the Julius Baer Foundation which is dedicated to supporting initiatives around the globe focused on addressing wealth inequality.

Prior to Julius Baer, Laura was Managing Director of the Credit Suisse Foundation and Global Head of Corporate Citizenship & Foundations at Credit Suisse, responsible for all of the bank’s global philanthropic commitments, partnerships and employee engagement. In this role she co-founded a number of public private partnerships including the SDG Impact Finance Initiative. Laura’s earlier career was in strategy consulting with Booz and Company as well as with a number of education and financial inclusion start-ups, NGOs and corporates.

Laura has an MBA from London Business School and is a Fellow of the Aspen Institute.
She serves on the boards of several organizations and is Chairwoman of the Swiss Capacity Building Facility.

Tony is an inspirational musician and story-teller. He is palestinian, living in Zurich since many years with his wife and two daughters. Tony’s interest lies in the use of drumming to expand awareness, to connect to oneself and to change.

Pause is an experimental project by Sahitya and Harsh encompassing two primary projects and a third experimental project at the moment.

Sahitya is a western classical pianist and a student of Dhrupad. Harsh likes playing around with noisy electronic sounds.

Francesca is a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Fellow at the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm (Sweden) and at University of Zurich (Switzerland). She is also an affiliated researcher to the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC). Her project, LIBRA, aims at computing the sustainability trade-offs of investments in artificial intelligence (AI). Economist by background, Francesca holds a PhD in Climate Change Sciences and Management from Ca’ Foscari University (Venice, Italy).

Rana is a curator, economist, writer, and filmmaker. He steers REProduce Artists, a collective of artists, organizers, and content creators that produce interventions in non-traditional spaces, engaging with music and video in modular, sequential plays – all taking advantage of the aesthetics of spaces as varied as former mills, bakeries, and hotels while producing them into five hour embedded experiences where up to eight different performances unfold.

His doctoral research was on risk construction in a regulatory context, and the underlying dynamics of how we explore uncertainty with regards to new technologies. The theoretical framework of this research underpins his explorations within live music presentation models and how patronage and sponsorship interact within the uncertainty that pop culture engineering presents.

He currently lives between Canada and India.

Noémi is a movement and somatic arts facilitator with an unwavering passion for shadow work, deepening intimacy, emotional processing through the soma (body). She guides individuals and groups into deeper awareness of listening and understanding the dynamics of mind, heart and soul and helps them discover the hidden truth through conscious movement.

She supports people to rediscover their authentic selves by using the power of their bodies. Through her guidance and embodiment practices, she aims to create a profound sense of connection and empower participants to embrace their uniqueness. She believes that as human beings, we can learn to navigate our emotions in a healthy way, strengthen our resilience: somatic practice is key in this process.

Part of the process is to create visual expressions of the inner landscapes, that can bring clarity to chaos and a more compassionate way of feeling and living. Noemi inspires people to creatively and actively engage with whats within one self and the world outside. She currently deepens her knowledge in somatic trauma healing and transdisciplinary arts therapy.

Chloé is a photographer, community arts worker, and cultural outreach practitioner. Trees and people are at the heart of her work, reflecting her interest in the web of life and the relationships between living beings. She works within communities, in public spaces and museums, as well as in settings where people’s freedom is restricted, such as prisons and other institutions. Through photography and participatory art, she seeks to foster dialogue, creativity, and social cohesion. She also collaborates with NGOs and cultural organisations on photographic projects that bring people together, strengthen social connections, and support individual wellbeing. Her approach connects photography, cultural mediation, and social engagement, using photography as a tool for participation, inclusion, and dialogue.

Helder has learned and worked with recognized permaculturists like the cocreator of permaculture Bill Mollison, and other pioneers of this movement like Geoff Lawton, Doug Bullock, Rosemary Morrow, Darren Doherty and Sepp Holzer, to name a few, and in the major world climatic regions. In this process Helder has been researching & implementing sustainability principles in a wide variety of environments, from urban and rural plots in the north and south of Europe to the the arid landscapes of Egypt & Turkey and lately big scale areas of tropical jungles of Peru and Brazil and favilitated knowledge sharing with tribal communities of Quechua and Shipibo tradition.

Helder is a strong supporter of low-income farmers and focuses his work on the creation of strong social structures to build strong foundations for resilient communities. His niche lies in the creation of harmonious social and natural landscapes that demonstrate a high quality of life and a paradigm shift. He is the founder of New School Permaculture and is very passionate about non-formal education and creative methodologies to deliver knowledge.

Karen is a biological oceanographer, bridge-builder, and voice for the unseen depths. Guided by a deep connection to nature and a fascination for the unknown, she studied Marine Sciences in Spain to better understand how life on Earth is interconnected.

Drawn to the stillness, vastness, and mystery beneath the surface, Karen sees the ocean not as a distant resource, but as the planet’s life-support system. As a child, she remembers coral reefs bursting with color and life—an experience that continues to shape her relationship with the ocean today.

Her work moves between science, advocacy, and environmental reflection, bringing attention to the fragile ecosystems of the deep sea and the growing pressures placed upon them. The ocean is not a resource we sustain; it is the system that sustains us. Equally at home in the mountains as in the ocean, Karen is often drawn to the edge—questioning, challenging, and inviting others to reconnect with the rhythms of the living world.

Amna Mawaz Khan is a Pakistani classical dancer, theatre artist, feminist, and political activist born and raised in Pakistan. She trained in Bharatanatyam from age 11 under Indu Mitha and later expanded into Kathak, Uday Shankar techniques, and folk dance. Her artistic work often links dance and theatre with social issues such as women’s rights, climate justice, and public debate.

She has been active in left-wing organizing, including the Awami Workers Party and as a founding member of Women Democratic Front. She is known for using performance as a form of resistance and awareness-building in Pakistan and internationally

Carly is a yoga teacher dedicated to creating practices that cultivate presence, balance, and inner peace. Through mindful movement, conscious breathing, and meditation, she offers a welcoming space where students of all levels can reconnect with themselves and begin the day with clarity and intention. Her classes encourage a deeper awareness of body, breath, and the quiet wisdom within.

Miro envisions a world where every breath leads to moments of discovery, healing, and empowerment. As a breathwork facilitator, Miro combines sacred space creation, cacao rituals, and breathwork to inspire personal transformation. His work is guided by a deep belief in the power of kindness, compassion, and mindful breathing to enhance global well-being.

Jyothi is a Neurodivergent Psychiatrist from Kerala, India and is a consultant psychiatrist to the NHS, UK.

Daisy has roots from Chile and Italy and grew up in Switzerland. She is a spoken word poet and movement facilitator.

Daisy struggled with depression and drug addiction at a young age, and experienced the limits of conventional therapy. She felt the need for somatic approacthes to have a real breakthrough and start living the life she wanted. After an intense study and work of over five years with Brazilian choreographer Gisela’s Rocha’s Movement for Life method, Daisy is excited to share this movement practice with Kaleido every morning.

Sara has been active for 15 years in different environmental and climate organisations and has a degree in environmental and energy systems engineering. Currently working with helping cities to finance nature-based solutions (NBS), in her free time she’s working on the project “Reconnect to what matters” (www.reconnect.earth). Together with others she likes exploring how we can change or build a new economic system (being a fan of Wellbeing Economics) and how we can build resilience together, to withstand possible collapses.

Nithin is a sound artist, curator and musician from Kerala, India.

Fascinated by all things ‘sound’ and ‘listening’, Nithin stumbled across his passion for curating listening experiences. His artistic practice revolves around facilitating listening spaces that allow listeners to enter an open, empathetic, and attentive states of mind. Nithin’s work has found homes in various platforms like Serendipity Arts Festival (Goa), Hyderabad Literature Festival, Ashoka University (Delhi), OtherPeople (NY), Radio Al Hara (Ramallah, Palestine), BoxoutFM (Delhi), BuchBasel (Switzerland)

Nithin is currently based in Berlin and is pursuing a Master’s in Sound Studies and Sonics Arts at the University of Arts in Berlin. Nithin has been programming Free.wav, an electronic music and sonic arts residency, since 2021 at Bhoomi Farms, set up by his family as an arts residency space.

Precious Plastic Zurich is a project and a part of the global community of people concerned with the use and recycling of plastic. We believe that the value of this resource should not be lost at the end of products’ lives.

Trent is one of the co-founders and the Managing Director of the World Spirit of the Game Foundation. He is also founder and President of 10 Million Discs, an international NGO which uses the unique sport of Ultimate frisbee to advance a wide array of social and humanitarian causes around the world.

His background includes a wide variety of start-ups, both operating and consulting, and he has utilized that experience to help 10 Million Discs develop a diverse global network with very low overhead. His vision is to put that network to use, taking Spirit of the Game pilot programs developed and tested in Switzerland and spreading them globally.

Trent is a US citizen, Swiss resident and lives in Zurich with his wife and 3 year old son

Her passion for cooking was born in the warmth of the home, as a legacy full of love traveling through the women of her family: her great-grandmother, her grandmother, her mother, until reaching her own hands. Always moved by a deep desire to care for others, she understands cooking as the sincere expression of her values and a mirror of her way of inhabiting the world.

For her, the moment when people gather around a table is a sacred space where time stands still in little pleasures, creating a connection where everyone’s energy is brought to the exact same level.

With a journey born from practice and consolidated independently, she has made nomadic cooking her trade, traveling wherever her culinary creations are requested. Within the space of retreats, she considers food as the common thread that has the power to elevate and sustain part of the experience. Through a conscious proposal rooted in her Mediterranean essence and based on the earth that sustains us —with plant-based, vegetarian, vegan, local, and seasonal menus—, she seeks the art of merging nutrition and taste with subtle balance and delicacy. She accompanies each retreat with listening, care, and good energy, opening a path so that each person can tune in with their body and energy through comforting meals.

In every recipe she leaves a gesture, an intention, and a heartbeat, convinced that cooking from the heart is one of the purest forms of loving and nourishing the soul.

Alex is a sound therapist, dancer and scientist. They are interested in the subtle perception of what emerges when bodies connect via music and dance. Another interest is the sustainability of traditional building techniques.

Sonja is a death and grief doula. With death as her greatest teacher, she has spent the last few years digging deeper into what it means to age and die in modernity. She offers grief circles and workshops on death for her community in Zurich and hopes that conversations around death drop their taboo and become instead a normal part of life, welcoming the natural curiosities of the human condition.

Annalena is a writer and researcher at the International Inequalities Institute, LSE. Her current work looks at how people reimagine success beyond meritocratic frameworks through collaborative digital storytelling across the UK, Brazil, and South Africa. She works at the intersection of inequality research and creative practice, using storytelling and visual methods not as supplementary tools but as a form of knowledge that merges value and fact.

Anna has spent much of her life walking between different worlds – the practical and the mystical, the visible and the unseen. Her professional path took her into the corporate world of finance, and her deeper interests have drawn her towards the symbolic, the unknown, and the transformative dimensions of human experience. This journey eventually led her to complete a three-year immersion in transpersonal psychology, indigenous wisdom traditions, and expanded states of consciousness, with a focus on liminal states and inner transformation.

Jan is a assionate transformation catalyser. Born in 1977 (333 ppm), father of two teenage boys (he/him).

Naveen is Co-founder and Creative Director of Kaleido.
He’s passionate about catalyzing the creative potential of individuals and social systems.

He embodies several selves, as a community organizer, poet, somatic arts facilitator, friend, son, brother, partner and recovering academic.

He has co-founded several organizations including Humane Warriors, which mobilizes North-South action for building socio-environmental equity together with historically marginalized communities, and The Origin AG, which develops mindful technologies and tools for creativity. He was formerly a senior researcher and lecturer for robotics at ETH Zurich.

He currently lives and plays between Zurich and Berlin.

Giulia Dazzi is a singer, songwriter and mandala artist based in Switzerland.

The Kaleido Experience is co-created by all of us!