Boston – October 05, 2026 -- Tickets for a new immersive experience exploring how the brain creates meaning from ordinary objects sold out shortly after going on sale, organizers confirmed.
The Perception BoxTM Adventure will run from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. on Saturday, November 14, at Boston's SoWa Power Station. The event is a collaboration between nonprofit Unlikely Collaborators and Boston cultural group The Jar, which has been a grantee of Unlikely Collaborators for the past two years.
Elizabeth R. Koch leads a night built around a simple object test
Elizabeth R. Koch, founder and CEO of Unlikely Collaborators, will lead the evening, which blends neuroscience, storytelling, live music and personal reflection. Guests will examine a collection of curious objects, toys and trinkets and track the assumptions, memories and emotional associations their minds generate in response.
"Humans are meaning-making, story-creating creatures. Give us an ordinary object and almost instantly, our minds begin filling in the blanks," Koch said, describing how people name objects, assign them purpose and link them to past experiences or people they know.
The format is built on Koch's Perception Box framework
The event draws on the Perception Box, a framework Koch developed to describe the subjective mental models -- shaped by beliefs, memories, physiology and unconscious patterns -- through which individuals interpret reality. Organizers say becoming aware of this internal "box" can create space for more curiosity and openness toward others.
Two organizations plan further joint events after this one
Guy Ben-Aharon, founder and executive director of The Jar, said the partnership gives his community "an entirely new way" to encounter art and ideas by turning attention inward. The Jar, founded in Boston in 2019, builds cultural programming -- including staged readings, salons and comedy -- around equity and connection across difference. Additional collaborative events between the two organizations are already in development.