Processing Community Day is a global initiative by the Processing Foundation, where local code and tech communities organise one-day events to celebrate art, code, and community. For the fifth time we’re hosting Processing Community Day in central Aarhus. This time under the theme "Bending Networks."
PCD @Aarhus 2026 invites you to explore with us what digital cultures can be when we think beyond extraction, surveillance and commodification. Big Tech was never built for us anyway. Most major platforms compromise their ethical obligations to their users by default, and it’s time to explore other options.
PCD @Aarhus 2026 looks at some of the many other ways we can live with technology in our daily lives: open-source software and hardware for your local community or personal use. Aesthetic and exploratory programming for poetic and artistic expression. Tools and ideas for much more sustainable compute.
Whether you want to learn from others or simply connect with kindred spirits—whether you’re new to working with tech, or a seasoned professional—you are welcome to join us for an amazing day in Aarhus. Bring your laptop.
Processing Community Day @Aarhus 2026 is organised by Code&Share[ ] and Interfjæs in collaboration with ALRUM, Aarhus Billedkunstcenter, but actually built and produced by Aakanksha Agrawal, Anders Aarvik, Ulf Dalvad Berthelsen, Margrete Lodahl Rolighed, Sofie Meta Schroeder, Kristoffer Ørum and Anders Visti.
Program
10.00PCD Introduction
10.10Nynne Just Christoffersen: Workshop #1. Convivial Coding for beginners with p5.js Sign up hereDo you dream of building a beautiful / strange / ethereal / non-commercial and collaborative internet? In this beginner-friendly workshop you will learn about the foundational building blocks of code with the p5.js coding framework. P5js is a JavaScript dialect of Processing: a creative coding language that can be used to code, without the need for downloading new programmes or any prior knowledge of coding more broadly.
12.00LUNCH BREAK (We don't serve lunch for PCD participants)
12.45Intro to presentations
12.55Tanya Ravn Ag: Bending Networks, Bending Futures. Artistic Experiments with Algorithms and Alternative Digital Futures Since 1990The evolving history of digital culture is often told as a story of technological inevitability. The history of digital art suggests otherwise. Drawing on research into algorithmic practices in Danish art since 1990, this talk traces how artists have bent digital systems, cultures, and imaginaries toward alternative technological futures and ways of inhabiting them.
Ulf Dalvad Berthelsen + Digital Literacy Aarhus: Life-friendly ComputingThe presentation introduces Life-friendly Computing as a sustainable approach to computational practices. It is grounded in a broad understanding of sustainability that encompasses environmental, social, and cultural dimensions and emphasizes technological literacy, agency, and solidarity.
Ukrudt.net: Let a Thousand Thistles Blossom: Sprouting feminist community servers in the boring monoculture of big techMembers of ukrudt.net will give a brief presentation on why you should gather friends and start a community server, and how you might already have the seeds at home to do it. We will delve into how we organise, and how taking care of a server creates abundance that helps us unravel our communities from big tech.
14.10BREAK
14.30Malthe Stavning Erslev: No chatbots here: writing with bidirectional language modelsA few examples of working with and against language models beyond the chatbot format, using small, local, and importantly bidirectional models. Some reflections about how writing with computers may become less boring again, even in the age of so-called AI.
Christy Westhovens: Building grassroot communication infrastructuresThe internet is broken. Let’s scavenge the parts to build something new. Grassroot network-building is a collective exercise in exploring needs and desires in the way we communicate and share resources. A community controlled, low-profile and low-tech mesh-network based on the Reticulum Network Stack.
Panagiotis Vasilopoulos (n0toose): Democratizing FOSS under Pressure – My Codeberg RetrospectiveThanks to platform decay and geopolitical instability, the EU thinks it should use more open-source to turn more independent. Shouldn’t open-source developers do that too? Using Codeberg as a frame of reference, I will talk about the importance of using open, democratic platforms and what challenges they face under increasing demand.
15.45Frederik la Cour"Bending Networks." Changeover live performance with maxmsp + eurorack synths
16.00Christy Westhovens: Workshop #2: Undoing devices, a collective hacking workshop. Sign up hereOur neighbourhoods are filled with ‘smart’ household objects. From smart lamps and doorbells, to televisions, cameras and fridges.
We will open the black box and poke at the insides. You will get an introduction into reverse engineering and research skills. You might open up a device to study it, dive into open-source intelligence to find hints about its impact, or go into the neighbourhood to map them.
No prior experience necessary! A laptop might come in handy :)
18.00PCD @Aarhus 2026 ends!
During the program: Life-friendly hacking, Digital Literacy Aarhus.
Participants are invited to take part in a range of life-friendly hacking activities. Throughout the day, you are welcome to visit our hacker table, where Digital Literacy Aarhus will be ready to help you install Linux on your computer, switch from Big Tech services to more sustainable alternatives, and explore different options for email, web browsing, chat, and other digital tools.
Refreshments will be provided for PCD audiences throughout the day