Co-creation and remote geographical locations:Interview with the Denmark-based Collective
The members of the Denmark-based collective share their thoughts on how distance shapes the creative process, what possibilities and limitations it brings, and which crucial aspects of arts cannot be built online.
The iCoDaCo project is based on virtual collaboration between ten collectives across Europe. Do you think it is possible to fully co-create live art without sharing a physical space?
We think it depends entirely on the kind of work and collaborations you want to create. Different artistic practices ask for different methodologies.
For us, working with live art, participation and embodied practices, physical presence is not simply a practical condition, it is part of the artistic material. Presence, intuition and the subtle ways we read one another shape how we create.
Because we had never met the other collectives before iCoDaCo began, building artistic trust online became a very different experience from building it in person. One of the clearest things the project revealed to us was that exchanging artistic research and building artistic connections are not necessarily the same process. We spent many hours together sharing practices, ideas and reflections, yet we don’t leave the project feeling that we know one another particularly deeply. That isn’t a criticism of the project or the people involved, it is simply an honest reflection on what this particular format made possible.
Rather than seeing this as a weakness, it has left us with curiosity. Looking back, we wonder whether we were asking the digital format to do something it wasn’t designed to do. Instead of translating a physical residency into Zoom meetings, one question coming up is: what kinds of artistic collaborations are only possible because they happen online?
We know there are communities that build profound relationships entirely through digital spaces. They don’t imitate physical presence, they create their own rituals, languages and forms of intimacy. We don’t work in those ways ourselves, but they make us curious about what an artistic methodology designed specifically for digital collaboration could look like.
At times, iCoDaCo felt less like one collective and more like islands meeting. There was generosity, openness and a genuine willingness to share, yet we all remained rooted in our own local realities. Perhaps that fragmentation wasn’t something to overcome. Perhaps it was simply the reality of this particular form of collaboration.
How do you evaluate the organization, communication, and tools that were used to bring the collectives closer together and give their artistic research a unified direction?
The regular online meetings in the end of each residency created a shared rhythm where we could exchange artistic research, methodologies and reflections. We appreciated that the format itself remained open to experimentation throughout the project.
For us, the smaller breakout groups became some of the richest moments. They created more intimate spaces where conversations felt less like presentations and more like genuine dialogue.
Interestingly, what connected us to the others the most was rarely the artistic material itself. The strongest exchanges happened when we artists spoke honestly about uncertainty, failed experiments, practical obstacles or questions that were still unresolved. Those conversations revealed much more about how each collective actually works than presenting research alone.
The project also made visible that every collective arrived with a different understanding of what collectivity means. Rather than trying to resolve those differences, it became interesting simply to witness them. Every collective carries its own culture, rhythms, values and ways of making decisions.
What were the biggest challenges of collaborating remotely? Without the possibility of meeting in person, did you encounter moments of misunderstanding or differing interpretations?
For us, the biggest challenge wasn’t the technology itself. It was everything that surrounds artistic collaboration that disappears online.
Our work often begins long before and after rehearsals begin and end. It grows through shared meals, cute informal conversations, travelling together, parties, moments of silence, disagreements, care and simply spending time in the same space. Those things are simply not possible online in a two-hour Zoom meeting.
Sharing artistic research in a large online group could also become quite presentational. The smaller conversations often created much richer exchanges because there was more space for curiosity and vulnerability.
It is also important to remember the context in which iCoDaCo began. The project was conceived during the pandemic, when digital collaboration wasn’t simply a choice, it was a necessity. Looking back now, we realise how much many of us were longing to meet again physically. That inevitably shaped our experience.
Different interpretations certainly emerged, but we don’t see that as a problem. Difference is precisely what makes international collaboration exciting. The question is how enough artistic trust can develop for those differences to become something we can genuinely play with together.
On the other hand, did working separately as diverse collectives lead to any new or unexpected approaches or interpretations?
One of the strengths of iCoDaCo was that every collective remained deeply rooted in its own context instead of trying to produce one unified artistic voice. That allowed many different perspectives, practices and artistic languages to exist alongside one another.
Our own experience with digital collaboration has mostly been in one-to-one collaborations with artists from different disciplines, particularly visual artists and musicians. In those projects, working remotely felt very natural. Material travelled back and forth over time, with each person responding, transforming and building upon what the other had created. The distance became part of the artistic process rather than something to overcome.
That experience feels quite different from trying to build a collective artistic practice with many people meeting simultaneously online. It has made us reflect on how different forms of collaboration ask for different methodologies, and that perhaps the size of the group, the artistic discipline and the desired outcome all shape what kinds of digital collaboration can truly flourish.
Do you see this model as the future of international artistic collaboration?
We don’t see it as the future. We see it as one possible way of collaborating, and one that is still evolving.
For us, iCoDaCo was as much an experiment in collaboration as it was an artistic project. Rather than giving us clear answers, it exposed both the possibilities and the limitations of working together across distance. That, in itself, feels valuable.
Digital collaboration opens doors. It makes international exchange more accessible, more environmentally conscious and, in many cases, financially possible. At the same time, our experience reminded us that collaboration is not only about exchanging ideas or artistic research. It is also about building artistic trust, shared intuition and a sense of collective belonging, and those things often develop through simply spending time together.
We don’t think the question is whether digital collaboration can replace physical collaboration. For us, it can’t. But neither do we think physical meetings are the only way forward. The interesting question is how the two can support one another, and how we can stop expecting them to produce the same kinds of relationships or artistic outcomes.
Perhaps that is what we value most about iCoDaCo. It didn’t leave us with certainty. Instead, it made us more curious.
How do artistic relationships actually develop? What creates trust across distance? When does distance become an artistic resource rather than an obstacle? And what kinds of artistic practices might emerge if digital collaboration is treated as its own medium rather than a substitute for being in the same room?
Those are some of the questions we leave the project with.