Tech Fresco (by Bleen & Global Shapers Brussels)

A collaborative workshop to understand, examine and discuss the systemic impacts of technology from printing to generative AI. The Tech Fresco is a collaborative, 100% low-tech workshop that questions our relationship with digital technologies. The tech world keeps accelerating: gen AI, facial recognition, deepfakes, mass surveillance, increasingly precarious work... One question is hard to avoid. Can we still call it “progress” when innovation widens inequalities, threatens our freedoms and reshapes democracy? After raising awareness among more than 5,000 participants through various workshops, Bleen created the Tech Fresco in 2025 with a clear goal: to build on years of hands-on experience in sustainable IT and offer a systemic workshop. One that goes beyond talking about digital tech and opens the debate on its social, democratic, health and environmental impacts. Aware of the risk of generational amnesia, Bleen wanted to put the major milestones of information and communication technologies back into their historical context, to better understand the challenges of today and of tomorrow. Both interactive and reflective, this workshop invites you to hit pause on the dominant techno-solutionist narrative, separate fact from hype, and imagine fairer, more sustainable technological futures together. This event is co-organised by Bleen and the Global Shapers Brussels Hub. The evening will end with an informal get-together.