40,00 EURO

55. International Art Exhibitionla Biennale di Venezia

Maldives Pavilion

Port

abl

e N

atio

N55

. int

erna

tion

al a

rt e

xhib

itio

n la

Bie

nnal

e di

ven

ezia

M

ald

ives

Pav

ilio

n

Portable NatioN

disaPPearance as work in Progress - aPProaches to ecological roManticisM

55. International Art Exhibitionla Biennale di Venezia

MAldIVEs PAVIlIon

Portable NatioN

Disappearance as work in progress - approaches to ecological romanticism

Commissioner

Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture,Republic of Maldives

CuratorsCPS – Chamber of Public SecretsAlfredo CramerottiAida EltorieKhaled Ramadan

Associate curatorsMaren RichterCamilla Boemio

Assistant curatorsstine HoxbroeGalia Kirilovadorian BatyckaHanna Husberglaura McleanAbed AnoutiKalliopi Tsipni-Kolazadana Kopel

Organizing partnerGervasuti Foundation

With the support of

Catalogue edited bydorian BatyckaCamilla BoemioAlfredo CramerottiAida Eltorie

SupervisorMaria Paola Poponi

Graphic Projectlisa Camporesi

With the support of Berkeley University

AdvisorsMr. Henry Meyric Hughes, Hon. President AICA,General Coordinator of Council of Europe Exhibitions, UK.Ms. Hedwig Fijen, director Manifesta Foundation, netherland.

Thanks toYasmine Allamomar doniaContemporary Practices Art JournalMohamed RasheedMichael FadelThe Maldives national Universitydhivehi language AcademyYasmine Allamomar donaolympus Cinema, MaleImad Agency Photo ArchiveThe Maldives national MuseumGianpaolo Arena

Gervasuti Foundation Michele Gervasuti, PresidentFiona Biggiero, Artistic director

Gervasuti Foundation TeamRaggio di luna orsiGiorgia MisGiulia MattutiniAlessia AconeAbdul Aziz CissChiara MassiniMarialuce Breddolara GasparriMor Thiam

Gervasuti Foundation InternsThomas RosenblattMalenie Idlersara Cornejo lena Marylova Valerie GianniRachel Morrall

Parallel projects with the support of and collaborations with

55. International Art Exhibition, la Biennale di VeneziaMAldIveS PAvIlIOn

June 1st - November 24th, 2013Gervasuti FoundationVia Garibaldi, Fondamenta sant’Ana, Castello 995, Venice

www.marettieditore.com All rights reserved. no reproduction and mechanically or electronically transmission of the present book is allowed in any parts, except with the permission of the editor’s copyright.

© Maretti Editore 2014All rights reservedIsBn 978 88 89477 519

Chamber of Public SecretsChamber of Public secrets (CPs) is a production collective of critical art and culture: an informative, non-profit, independent contributor to the global art scene. The collective works as a network of artists, curators and thinkers who have been collaborating since 2004 in the organization, production and circulation of exhibitions, video and film festivals, art events, experimental TV and radio programs, political fictions and documentaries. CPs members also set up debate forums and talks and publish books and articles on issues like migration, mobility, representation, colonialism, gender and difference to help debate the role of art, its responsibility and its relation to society.CPs co-curated the Biennale Manifesta 8 in spain 2010-11, curated events and cooperated with at institutions like Museo nacional Centro de Arte Reina sofía, Madrid; Guangzhou Triennial, Guangdong Museum of Modern Art, China, and UCCA Beijing; danish Film Institute; nikolaj, Copenhagen Art Center; Museum for Contemporary Art, denmark; and the nordic House Reykjavík, Iceland; Cinema Paris; KIAsMA Museum in Helsinki, Queens Museum, nY; Hamburg Film Festival; docu-days Beirut; Video Brazil; der Kunstwerk in Berlin; né a Beyrouth lebanese film festival; sidney Film Festival; Milano Film Festival and san Francisco Arab Film Festival.CPs members are part of globally recognized art associations, among others The Art Consultancy Unit (ACU), the International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art (IKT), and the International Association of Art Critics (AICA).

Chamber of Public Secrets teamwww.chamberarchive.org

ASAC

lIAFlofoten International

Art Festival 2013

Critical Media Production www.doculogia.com

Portable NatioN

Disappearance as work in progress - approaches to ecological romanticism

4

contents

6 InTRodUCTIon Chamber of Public Secrets team 7 nATURE As GUIdE Chamber of Public Secrets team

8 THE MAldIVEs PAVIlIon And GERVAsUTI FoUndATIon: PREsERVATIon, CHAnGE And sPIRITs oF REsIsTAnCE Fiona Biggero

11 PoRTABlE nATIon - dIsAPPEARAnCE As A WoRK In PRoGREss Chamber of Public Secrets team

15 GoInG FoRWARd Chamber of Public Secrets team

OFFICIAl PROJeCTS 16 Mohamed Ali Moomin Fouad 21 sama Alshaibi29 Ursula Biemann40 stefano Cagol 51 Wael darwesh55 Thierry Geoffrey aka Colonel58 Khaled Hafez 66 Heidrun Holzfeind & Christoph draeger72 Hanna Husberg, laura Mclean & Kalliopi Tsipni-Kolaza74 Achilleas Kentonis & Maria Papacaharalambous80 Gregory niemeyer / Chris Chafe, Perrin Meyer and Rama Gottfried84 Khaled Ramadan in collaboration with Abed Anouti96 oliver Ressler102 Klaus schafler110 Patrizio Travagli116 Wooloo

PARAllel PROJeCTS 122 Micro-Macro Area: From the Indian ocean to the Adriatic and from the Maldives to the Marche Venue UNIVPM – Università Politecnica delle Marche Curated by Camilla Boemio

124 Paul Miller Aka dJ spooky126 Ehsan Fardjadniya 128 Marian Tubbs130 Ravi Agarwal, Camilla Boemio and Khoj International artists - Associations Workshop132 Celeste Pimm134 Mark dahl 136 oliver Ressler138 Mike Watson 140 Josephine starrs and leon Cmielewski142 PRoVIsÕEs (Provisions) - Book launch144 PRoVIsÕEs - Uma conferência visual146 Fielding states: depth Projection148 Hanna Husberg, laura Mclean and Kalliopi Tsipni-Kolaza Contingent Movements symposium

CRITICAl TeXTS And THeOReTICAl COnTeXTUAlISATIOn152 An Archipelago of new Geographies A conversation between Alfredo Cramerotti and Camilla Boemio

154 Could We or should We Make It Work? Art between science and Research Maren Richter

157 A Global Map of nature dialogues with Ravi Agarwal, leon Cmielewski and Josephine starr Camilla Boemio

160 The Crisis of In(aud)(vis)ibility: a Perspective from the dumpster Dorian Batycka

165 Contingent Movements Laura McLean

171 A conversation between Aida Eltorie, Alfredo Cramerotti and Maren Richter Chamber of Public Secrets team

InvIted ArtIsts

OFFICIAL PROJECTS MOhAMEd ALIMOOMIn FOuAdSAMA ALShAIbIuRSuLA bIEMAnnSTEFAnO CAgOLWAEL dARWEShThIERRy gEOFFREy AkA COLOnELkhALEd hAFEzhEIdRun hOLzFEInd & ChRISTOPh dRAEgERhAnnA huSbERg, LAuRA MCLEAn & kALLIOPI TSIPnI-kOLAzAAChILLEAS kEnTOnIS & MARIA PAPACAhARALAMbOuSgREgORy nIEMEyER / ChRIS ChAFE, PERRIn MEyER And RAMA gOTTFRIEdkhALEd RAMAdAn In COLLAbORATIOn WITh AbEd AnOuTIOLIvER RESSLERkLAuS SChAFLERPATRIzIO TRAvAgLIWOOLOO

PARALLEL PROJECTSPAuL MILLER AkA dJ SPOOkI MARIAn TubbSRAvI AgARvAL, nAvJOT ALTAF, AMAR kAnWARCELESTE PIMMMARk dAhALOLIvER RESSLERJOSEPhInE STARRS And LEOn CMIELEWSkI MARCOS LuTyEnS

7

IntrodUctIon

The history of artistic aesthetics of the Maldives is not widely documented. The archipelago is rather known for its most central aesthetical topics – the supreme beauty of the ocean, ecology and environment. The first Maldives Pavilion at 55th Venice Biennial therefore suggests treating the culture and nature of the Maldives as the central subject, marking its im-portance through its ecology, and what it would mean for the islands to disappear. Ecology and nature in the current state of global warming is no longer about national borders or cer-tain regions. The fact that the impact of changing nature links Maldives and Venice in the environmental scenario of rising sea levels thereby became the starting point to think of an in-ternational discursive format rather than a national represen-tation of the island nation of the Maldives in a narrow sense.

Consisting of a large team of five curators and sixteen contrib-uting international artists/groups, we wish to partially capi-talize on our diverse cultural identities from Europe and the Middle East, alluding to the overlap of international cultures that coexist on this island paradise. on the one hand, West-ern thoughts concerning nature have been marked by dual-ism, the notion of an opposition between nature and culture. on the other hand, Eastern thoughts consider nature a guide and source of intellectual and spiritual inspiration, because in the East thoughts the natural world simply “is” the law, and human activities are adjusted according to its mechanisms. The collaboration we want to capture is to prove the dual-ity between art/culture and its inter-dependencies with en-vironmental causes. only through such activities are we able to regulate interests into ways of developing positive impacts that will help avoid the negative ones bestowed by any singu-lar paradigm or set of cultural ecologies. observation is what converts possibility into reality.

By inviting such a diverse collective of artists and thinkers to donate their powerful visual and intellectual abilities to the Maldives pavilion, our intention is to provide a meaningful experience and breadth of knowledge about the notion of ‘Contemporary Environmental  Romanticism.’ This concept we have applied in relation to the nature and culture of the Maldives. We are very thankful to all the contributors for mak-ing this experimental approach to a national pavilion pos-sible. Consequently, we are working in the direction of how Contemporary Environmental Romanticism underlines the interpretation of nature as a source of aesthetic experience, by pursuing a critical view on the relation between ecology, art and political-economic constellations. In this way, audi-ences may apply their own knowledge and daily experience to the understanding and appreciation of this particular envi-ronmental issue.

nAtUre As GUIde

The position of nature is often determined by the contexts within which non-human entities are integrated into human cultural understanding. And because our ability to value the non-human world surrounding us is mediated by this under-standing of what nature is or can be, a set of environmental ethics would direct our awareness to the social and political milieu within which human beings become aware of that world. Human intervention in nature constantly leads to new interpretations of nature and the concept of the natural. This interventional contact often reveals new human thoughts and cultural values and a new codes and ethics, which can be constructive and destructive at the very same time. Accord-ing to environmental ethicist Roger J. King, nature cannot be assumed from the way nature itself is. It all depends on the place, which nature has acquired in our discourses with each other. Therefore nature cannot be independent from our cul-turally based interpretation and understanding of what it is. This makes nature not something in itself, but rather a con-ceptual artefact of human cultural existence. Before we can pose the moral question of our obligations towards nature, we inevitably bring before us a particular conception of what nature is. To state that nature is an artefact is to say that we have no access to nature in itself or as it is, but we can gain partial access to it through heritage and knowledge of what we call the original.

our interpretation of nature can never be independent of the intellectual, artistic, emotional, and technological resources available to us. These resources constitute the prism, or con-text, within which what we call nature appears to us and with-in which we interpret our experiences of the natural world around us. In order to make nature our guide in matters of in-tellectuality and morality we have to understand what nature is, not by applying yet again a set of mechanical codes, but by inscribing ourselves to and within the pulse of nature itself. This may seem more problematic to comprehend than many in environmental ethics assume. our understanding of nature is still the product of cultural institutions and the multiplicity of interpretations of the natural world. We must ask how our present understanding of nature was constructed and how it has led us on to the particular path of environmental destruc-tion we currently face. The question therefore is: can human culture stop short from disciplining and moralizing nature, and if we do so can nature still remain our guide?

Chamber of Public Secrets team

8 9

the MAldIves PAvIlIon And the GervAsUtI FoUndAtIon: PreservAtIon, chAnGe And sPIrIts oF resIstAnce

We affirm finally that any deliberate attempt to reach a ratio-

nal and enduring state of equilibrium by planned measures,

rather than by chance or catastrophe, must ultimately be

founded on a basic change of values and goals at individual,

national and world levels.1

statement by the Executive Committee of the Club of Rome

That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but

that land is to be loved and respected

is an extension of ethics.2

A. Leopold

It is extremely likely [95 percent confidence] more than half

of the observed increase in global average surface tempera-

ture from 1951 to 2010 was caused by the anthropogen-

ic increase in greenhouse gas concentrations and other an-

thropogenic forcings together.3

The Fifth IPCC Report Climate Change 2013

1 statement by the Executive Committee of the Club of Rome in donella H. Meadows et. al., The Limits to Growth, new York: Universe Books, 1972, pp. 185-96.

2 Aldo leopold, A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There, oxford University Press, 1949

3 The Fifth IPCC Report Climate Change 2013 The Physical science Basis

The Gervasuti Foundation is proud to present “Portable nation”

the Maldives first national participation in the 55th Internation-

al Exhibition of the Venice Biennale. Curated by Chamber of

Public secrets in collaboration with the Gervasuti Foundation,

this site-specific project is a testament to a complex journey of

achievements and an unusual union of intents.

The theme of the Maldivian Pavilion’s show, denoted by its

subtitle ‘disappearance as a work in progress - Approaches

to Ecological Romanticism,’ addresses the alarming and much

debated issues in contemporary climate change and the con-

sequent threat to our cultural habitats and ways of life. The

current ecological issues faced by the Republic of the Mal-

dives are the starting point from which broader trans-national

sets of concerns are explicitly and implicitly investigated by

a group of international artists of Arab, European, American,

Australian as well as Maldivian origins. This research-based in-

ternational group show calls into question both our subjective

and cultural conceptions of nature and the increasing need to

re-evaluate our personal and collective attitudes and respon-

sibilities in the light of increasingly evident and growing global

preoccupations.

Interestingly this Island nation is hosted by a largely man-

made Island city. The former is an example of a natural para-

dise, renown for it’s stunning beaches and sticking environ-

ment, and the later is an extraordinary illustration of human

settlement and of unique architectural and engineering

achievements. Venice with its lagoon is in its entirety, is listed

as a World Heritage site. While the Maldives is the smallest

Asian nation, made up of about 1,200 islands, it has the lowest

ground level and the lowest natural high point in the world.

The islands are becoming increasingly difficult to sustain in

their original natural state, they also face the risks of inunda-

tion to the point of disappearance. It may be the first country

in the world lost to climate change, causing a mass climate-

refugee exodus. Venice and its lagoon are among the most

studied urban environmental systems in the world and still

they battle against rising sea levels and their devastating ef-

fects. Both these unique geographical locations suffer from

the flood of tourism, unsustainable transportation and tourist

structures that cater for this growing industry. Although the

kind of tourism is significantly different, the consequences of

this tourist traffic reflect the need to rethink ways of preserv-

ing Cultural Heritage, local identity and the environment.

The collaboration between Chamber of Public secrets, to-

gether with the network of adjunct curators and the Gerva-

suti Foundation stems from an extraordinary union of intents

and circumstances beginning with a fundamental desire to

address the urgency of our changing environment and the

responsibility and role we share as creative agents in these

rapidly changing times. Both organizations are set out to work

on projects that include the possibility of creating contexts to

discuss and open a dialogue between different practices and

review problems that threaten the very possibility of Cultural

Heritage. The Maldives curatorial project presents a platform

of environmental campaigners, artists and thinkers to reflect

on the necessity to re-think contemporary definitions of na-

ture and attempt to question the cultural interpretations and

the national and international environments within an art

context. The site-specific installations are set in the unusual

spaces of the Foundation, which are preserved as a tribute to

the importance of Cultural Ecology itself and the inherent risk

of the disappearance of Intangible Heritage, that include ways

of life, skills, traditions and so forth.

‘disappearance as a work in progress - Approaches to Ecologi-

cal Romanticism,’ also shares affinities with part of the mission

of the Gervasuti Foundation, namely the Preservation Through

Change Project, which focuses on an innovative experimen-tal  process which aims to be both local and international: preserving the uniquely inventive and rich cultural traditions of Venetian history through the promotion and production of interdisciplinary contemporary art practice.  The aim is to generate alternative awareness of preservation as well as an interdisciplinary and ethically engaged approach to culture. The Gervasuti Foundation is an interdisciplinary and interinsti-tutional non-profit art platform set up in 2004 between lon-don and Venice and is located in the Venetian area of Castello orientale.   Its mission is focused on cooperation and the cre-ation of projects that stimulate a respectful use and develop-ment of an area that, like so many others, risks being engulfed by global tourism, inevitably resulting in a of loss of cultural memory.

This has been a challenging project born of passion, determi-nation and deep conviction where each and every participant has been instrumental in making it come to life. It has been an honour to be part of such an ambitious and provocative venture. We would like to thank Chamber of Public secrets and the entire curatorial team, all 18 artists and participants of the on-going programme of events produced during the six months of the show, for their endless energy and dedication to the making of this first national presentation of the Repub-lic of the Maldives.

Fiona BiggieroArtistic Director

Gervasuti Foundation

11

PortABle nAtIon - dIsAPPeArAnce As A WorK In ProGress

The Maldives has been confronted with a stormy colonial and post-colonial history. It was and still is a country of a transitional nature and culture. Throughout the history of its culture, which dates back approximately 2000 years, a set of habits and traditions emerged which are still visible today. The archipelago is presently inhabited by 350,000 people, and over time they are a people who have changed and expanded their believes, habits and traditions. The heritage is a mixture of East African and south Asian influences. The country is situ-ated on the trading route that connects dubai and singapore. over the last century when the tourism industry was increas-ingly expanded to the third strongest sector worldwide, the Maldives became the epitome for tourists seeking exotic des-tinations. Throughout its history, the island nation has always described itself by a seemingly paradoxical set of emerging and submerging islands. After being a Portuguese, dutch and later a British colony, the Maldives gained its freedom in 1965 and has been a republic since then.The fact that is the Maldives is the planet’s lowest country, rising an average of 1.5 m above the ocean surface, and that it has the lowest natural highpoint in the world of 2.4 m above water. This has turned it into an element of struggle against the natural. A 60 cm raise in sea levels would see the entirety of the Maldives smothered by the ocean and make the Mal-divian population probably the first refugee-nation of global warming. A fundamental question thus emerges: what does it means for a culture, which formed an identity originated by living with the ocean, which built its entire language on the concept of living in this symbiosis, to be forced to speculate on relocating from the sea to the inland of the continent, as it was proposed by former President nasheed in 2011? This dramatic proposition spells out a general global dilemma, one that what writer and social activist naomi Klein depicts in her book ‘The shock doctrine.’ Klein uses the term ‘disas-ter capitalism’ to denote situations in which the global free market exploits local crises by pushing through controversial,

exploitative policies while citizens are too busy emotionally and physically reeling from disasters or upheavals to create an effective resistance. By way of example, right after a tsu-nami wiped out the coasts of southeast Asia in 2004, a huge amount of beaches in Thailand were auctioned off to tourist resorts, whereas the fishermen, who had lived at the sea for centuries, were pushed back in the hinterland. The destruc-tive power of financialization of natural disasters, the power to destroy important elements of everyday culture through the tsunami, was initially conceived by local environmental campaigners in the Maldives as a traumatic ‘rehearsal,’ since the damages on the islands were relatively small compared to other countries. The huge media attention was followed by the largest relief operations ever. But when international attention faded, post-tsunami challenges continued to have an impact on affected communities. six years later and just weeks before Fukushima, swiss artist Christoph draeger and Austrian artist Heidrun Holzfeind looked at what has been achieved, what went wrong and what challenges remain. on a three-month trip in 2010/11 to the five countries most affected, Thailand, Aceh/Indonesia, sri lanka, Maldives and Tamil nadu/India, the artists investigated the current state of architecture built or reconstructed in the aftermath of the tsunami that caused a significant impact to the quality of daily life. In recent years a wide range of artists felt the urge to respond to these complex constellations of power structures of eco-logical ethics, posed against industrial capitalism’s despo-liation of the environment. Their cultural practices introduce an intense debate of how critical art might contribute to an imagination of ecology that addresses social divisions related to geographies, one that also might enable a rethinking of eco-aesthetics, especially as regards to the relationship be-tween ecological art and democratic political composition.The exhibition ‘Portable nation-disappearance as a Work in Progress’ as the first official Pavilion of Maldives follows this axis by treating the culture and nature of the Maldives as the

central subject, while at the same time as a point of departure to tackle the micro and the macro aspects of what it would mean for the island nation to disappear, and consequently for the whole earth. Concurrently the exhibition aims to point out the very different aesthetical moves towards so-called eco-art. In order to reflect and include all these intentions the Maldives Pavilion aims to debate the complexity of national representation by proposing a more organic structure - ‘an ex-hibition as archipelago.’ national pavilions tend to emphasize order and stability. In response to this way of interpretation, Portable nations-disappearance as a Work-in-Progress rather seeks to offer a space for negotiation, of relational and trans-disciplinary practice on environmental discourse, philosophy, sociology, natural science, and activism. Conceived as an eco-aesthetics space, a platform for artists, environmental cam-paigners and thinkers from around the globe, the Maldives Pavilion aims to share and exchange ideas, thoughts and knowledge. sixteen artistic projects and a series of seminars, parallel exhibitions, master classes, a symposium and other events will take to proposing a series of questions in multifac-eted ways. The contributions vary from poetic and subjective approaches and forms of documentary, to using the ephem-eral as an aesthetic response to the notion of disappearance. The exhibited projects produce different models of social interaction by understanding the growing need to establish a new model of symbiosis in man-nature relationships, es-tablishing priorities for the usage and conservation of natural resources, and defining alternative patterns of education or the concept of productivity in the age of climate change. one consistent critical guideline throughout the exhibition is the element of water as an unfailing reservoir of references: water as a source of life and culture, a metaphor of memory - per-sonal as well as collectively, as an alarming indicator of global warming and a contested commodity and a visible mecha-nism of power relations in the age of an anthropogenic world. Italian artist Stefano Cagol, based in the Alps, proposed a simple as well as striking image to underlie how threats to the natural landscape can no longer be separated according to location. The loss of the so-called ‘internal ice’ of the Arctic, or the glaciers in the Alps, which in turn affect rising sea levels all over the world, is exemplified by a huge melting ice cube, which he positioned next to the canal on the Venice Arse-nale. Eco-aesthetical projects like Cagol’s intervention on the inter-connectivity of increasing sea levels raise the fundamen-

tal question, which many projects in the exhibition are also concerned: what kind of ‘trans-mediating governance’ does the symbiosis of humans and nature need in the near future? This is what social and political theorstis such as Bruno latour question as well, with the need of a concept of agencies that include nonhuman agendas into politics, or by artists, who are positing extensively experimental aesthetic approaches towards the topic. What governance is capable to consider the ‘uneven geographies’ between the West and the Global south? This imbalance is a main concern in Ursula Biemann’s rich body of work over the last decades. The video essay ‘deep Weather’ draws the connection between the relentless reach for fossil fuel resources, with their toxic impact on the climate, and the consequences this has for indigenous populations in remote parts of the world, by contrasting images from boreal forests of northern Canada with the affects of changing cli-mate in Bangladesh. The political economy of oil and water are put into focus by Gregory niemayer’s work ‘Polartide’ also, by relating the two phenomena of sea levels and stock valuations for oil companies, constructed in collaboration with Chris Chafe and Perrin Meyer as a platform on which we can listen to data about global climate change and corporate profits. The sound piece by the Associate director of the data and democracy Project illustrates the cumulative imaginative effects of collective actions. The intervention at the Maldives Pavilion’s entrance places two different fluctuating data sets in conversation with one another.The failure of global governance concerning the rising effects of global warming, particularly concerning the reduction of Co2 emissions, has created an intense culture for protest movements that believe that change could only be con-fronted through a radical transformation of society, effectively challenging the existing distribution of wealth and power re-lationships. Oliver Ressler’s three-channel video installation deals with this emerging social movement that questions and selectively fights the response (or non-response) of states and corporations to climate change. one example is the Climate Camp to close the Kingsnorth coal-fired power station east of london, UK, which took place in August 2008. The camp was organized to focus, above all, on providing space for people who believe that market approaches such as emissions trad-ing is not about the protection of the climate, but instead only about ensuring continued capitalist growth. For many, the term ‘ecology’ itself relates to the balance be-

12 13

tween organic natural life and a complex set of social, politi-cal and cultural relations, all co-existing simultaneously - as dorian Batycka elaborates in his essay published in this cata-logue, where he advances that:

The various levels of ecology – understood as mental, social and environmental – create a conceptual start-ing point and set of dynamics that at once inform the ways in which subjectivity is constructed as well.

The crucial question of the mental in relation to memory, as well as to the culture of nature, is in contrast to the concept of biopolitics – as implied in the eco-philosophy researched by Iraq born artist Sama Alshaibi. Her video installation ‘sil-sila’ (Arabic for ‘chain’) depicts the artist’s three-year journey through the deserts and endangered water sources of the Middle East and north Africa, across to the bountiful waters of the Maldives. By linking performances in the deserts and waters of the historical Islamic world with the nomadic tradi-tions of the region, and the travel journals of the 14th century Eastern explorer Ibn Battuta, Alshaibi seeks to unearth a story of continuity within the context of a threatened future. Egyp-tian artist Khaled Hafez on the other hand, offers a perspec-tive which addresses water in its different contexts as a frag-ile container for memory: filmed across different geographic locations and free of any linear narrative, the footage tackles water as a source of life, communication and transportation, but also of submersion and obliteration.

Philosopher Felix Guattari understood this dynamic perfectly, as Batycka states further, terming this as ‘ecosophy’1 that at once connected that various social, cognitive and environ-mental levels of ecology within a unifying set of principals characterized by an assemblage of machinic processes. This fluidity of concepts for those non-indoctrinated into the lan-guage of Guattari is forged by the manner in which he con-nects ‘nature’ with the concept of the machine – continuously evolving and catalyzing into heterogeneous trajectories of material and social becoming. According to Guattari:

We might just as well rename environmental ecology machinic ecology, because Cosmic and human praxis has only ever been a question of machines.

1 Felix Guattari (1989) Three Ecologies. (I. Pindar & P. sutton, Trans.) london, new Brunswick: Athlone Press, p. 28.

While Guattari articulates this ecosystem of machinic ecolo-gies as a process of perpetually governing systems dynamic and in motion, he links this trajectory with a networked set of processes (machines) that link together social, material and affective forces in ways that question the underlying distinc-tions between different specific value systems, for example:

Material assets, cultural assets, wildlife areas, as well as the social and international relations under the control of police and military machines.

This entry also addresses the question of political responsibil-ity, or what theorist TJ demos introduced as politics of ecolo-gy in ‘The Contingent Movements symposium’ presented by the Maldives Pavilion, addressing the need for long-term pro-cesses, which in the case of Venice for instance was followed by a long period of denying sustainable solutions of urban development, instead forcing the belief in technologies to sail around the topic of climate change. Austrian artist Klaus Schafler’s archive ‘Hacking the Future and Planet’ focuses on exactly this idea as well, drawing attention to the ambivalent character of large-scale interventions in the global climate system and to geo-engineering technologies that ‘hack the planet,’ in order to slow or even reverse our civilizations’ impact on the climate and environment to counter global warming. The use of knowledge in conjunction with science, as schafler critically poses, is likewise a concern of the media-installation by Cyprus-based artists Achilleas Kentonis and Maria Pa-pacaharalambous. Their room is conceived as a poetic, criti-cal, aesthetic, philosophical and scientific stroll within space and time. Through play and adventure it aims to retrieve hid-den knowledge and forgotten truths, bringing relationships, communication, even politics to a purely energetic level.

According to philosopher and intellectual historian Michel Foucault, there is a dominant paradigm that actively shapes our conception of reality, understood for Foucault as truth and knowledge, in addition to our social, economic, and po-litical institutions. The loss of identity or the loss of the ’self,’ leads one to sooner or later to consider ‘the disappearance of man’ as Foucault points out in several occasions. In the award-winning film ‘Happy Birthday’ by Maldivian filmmak-ers Mohamed Ali and Moomin Fouad, the hero is a simple man, living a normal life, until on his birthday he receives a call telling him that his wife and child have been kidnapped. He

is asked to get the ransom if he wants them back and by the time he finds out that this was just a hoax, it’s far too late. The film combines the idea of violence between an individual and collective disappearance, a subject that can be extrapolated and seen to reflect the problems the population of the Maldi-ves are currently facing.

displacement as a form of disappearance also resonates with the Italian artist Patrizio Travagli as well. Using the mirror as a multi-layered emblem for the collective vs. the individual, linked with the overload of image production, he offers a criti-cal mindset for the audience as participant.The evaluation of a disappearing culture that permeates ev-eryday life, it’s economy and ecology, was brought to the fore by the danish collective Wooloo. With a symbolic ges-ture placing a small, out-of-place element – coconuts from the Maldives – into the canals of Venice, Wooloo symbolically superimposed one sinking civilization onto another, serving as a reminder of both the resilience and fragility of nature. Featured on the nation’s official emblem, the coconut palm is not only the national tree of the Maldives, but also a major element of the island nation’s visual culture. Yet the image of coconuts in the water is also an image of destruction: fol-lowing the last tsunami to hit the Maldives, the vast num-ber of coconuts floating in the water was a major sign of ruin.

When it comes to the need of collective action towards cli-mate change artistic practice over the last number of years draws a lot attention to new forms of expression. It opens up channels of knowledge production that provide alterna-tives to the economic valuation of nature or promote a dif-ferent articulation of the commons against its corporate enclosure. The ‘Contingent Movement Archive’ organized by Hanna Husberg, laura Mclean and Kalliopi Tsipni–Ko-laza, works precisely on this. The online platform seeks to unpack the problematics and possibilities of the anticipated submersion and dissolution of the Maldives, exploring these contingencies within a global context. staged in the pavilion and in a symposium, the interdisciplinary archive captures a wide range of perspectives by mapping out potential migra-tion scenarios for the permanently displaced population and its culture. Projects like the archive highlighted as a trans-disciplinary approach around floods, changing watersheds, renewable energy and carbon profiling, sought to partner artists with scientists and theorists to create new dialogues

around climate change. The growing momentum of such projects sharpened the search for models of criticality in artis-tic practice and languages of resistance within existing power structures. The French-danish artist Thierry Geoffrey aka Colonel, tries to evaluate and expose these very same struc-tures confronting the art system with the notion of ecologi-cal emergency. Colonel seeks to offer his exhibition space to artists expressing emergencies and also requests space from others. What nation is willing to debate its capacity to share some of its territory? Thereby begging the question as con-cieved by Colonel: Can Emergencies Be Ranked?

Egyptian artist Wael darwesh, treats the notion of disap-pearance in different manners, by painterly applying large fields of flat solid color and mixed media to capture a fleet-ing moment in our pulsating memory. darwesh’s visual ex-perience attempts to explore the consequences on the col-lective memory and psyche of experiencing long periods of continuous change, inconsistencies, anticipation and sup-pressed actions. The absence of transparency, the inability to predict the next moment and the emergence of various predictions has led to many changes around and inside us. This visual sonata of solid planes of form blended with gold leaf and collage, are juxtaposed with abstract figures that seem to dramatically perform roles in a theatrical back-ground. Khaled Ramadan’s documentary film ‘Maldives To Be or not’, realized in collaboration with Abed Anouti, notes the parodies captured between Western culture and its long tradition of romanticizing the imagery of the East. Ramadan’s film addresses the confusion of the country’s fictional reality and how the Maldives today is wavering between the fiction of the West and the reality of the East, and how the island-ers are at the conjunction of Edward said’s theoretical duality ‘West is Culture, East is nature’. The film questions how the en-vironmental hazard about the Maldivian nature has become an over politicized notion, and why the nature has proven to be much more sustainable then the Maldivian culture. As a citizen of the Arab world, Ramadan wants to learn about what’s left of the shared history and how this amphibious na-tion is treating its contemporary culture in relation to its eco-logical strengths and weaknesses.

14 15

GoInG ForWArd

The current transformation of the physicality of the planet and

its climate and biosphere is considered so severe that scien-

tists have begun to use the term Anthropocene to mark a new

era where the Earth as a whole depends on what humans do

to it. The use of fossil energy has turned humans into a geo-

physical force. As is now widely known — particularly since

the scientific consensus established by the IPCC (Intergov-

ernmental Panel on Climate Change), most recently in sep-

tember 2013, which has rendered those who do not want to

face climate-change increasingly scarce (but, with continued

industry funding to wage their misinformation campaigns, by

no means extinct) — we live in a changing world of global

warming. The IPCC predicts a coming scenario of the world,

half uninhabitable, of rising seas and temperatures, drought

and water scarcity, and massive species extinction, which

will undoubtedly provoke geopolitical challenges regarding

resource distribution, environmental justice between devel-

oped countries and the global south, and vast climate migra-

tion. This future defines new imperatives for an ethics of living,

a politics of governing, and in turn provokes new challenges

for contemporary artistic practice.

Facing this impasse, one must be aware of the fact that what-

ever we know about the environment — knowledge that will

determine our future actions and chances of survival — we

owe to the diverse practices and institutions that represent

it. As such, we can perhaps only affirm the need for a critical

realism that both refuses to relinquish the validity of scientific

paradigms and remains dedicated to a guardedly analytical

approach to ecological discourse as a system of representa-

tions forged at the intersection of power and knowledge.

To this end, it is necessary when considering the formation

of environmental art to scrutinize the diverse meanings of

‘ecology’ and sometimes denaturalize the rhetoric of nature,

recognizing these buzzwords as deeply political, contentious

and ideological, something that we tried to propose with the

Maldives Pavilion for 55th Venice Biennial.

Chamber of Public Secrets team

oFFIcIAl Projects

16 17

MOhAMEd ALIMOOMIn FOuAdhAPPy bIRThdAy

BeyOnd THe dReAM / A CIneMA AS An ISlAnd The Maldives is a natural setting for cinema, which over the years have followed shooting and directors such as Ridley scott. The country’s film industry itself draws inspiration from Bollywood and several Mal-divian remakes of Hindi movies have made box office hits.

I was taking critical insights when I decided to call Emiliano Mon-tanari1, a filmosopher and a friend of the icon cinematic writer Enrico Ghezzi, in order to formulate for understanding the background of the Maldivian directors Mohamed Ali and Moomin Fouad.

The opinion of Montanari is that cinema is an island, the island of ‘real’But more that cinema is an archipelago, as is the Maldives isA broken puzzle of visionary fragmentsPhotograms shattered on the globe’s liquid sea of tearsCinema and Maldives are contiguous archipelagosThe CineMaldivesThe archipelago composed by the visions-islands of Indian, Indone-sian, Arab and African cinema recomposing...The contemporary globalized Bollywood on the Tiber  A titanic mockumentary that is Cinema itself Where tourists become pirates and pirates tourists Movies becomes islands zoomed through a cosmic Google eye And from the very top sidereal point of view All the frames suddenly recompose the cosmological archipelagoCinemaldives

Exactly an unveiling and denying of the great staging of life master-fully represented by Mohamed Ali and Moomin Fouad, a theater of the unexpected in which oscar Wilde and Pirandello are reinterpreted today to tell: the tragedy, the loss and the adventure of every day.

1 This text is a the result of a dialogue with Emiliano Montanari. ‘filmosopher,’ short-circuiting cinema – philosophy, his part collaborations with artists and philosopherssuch as david lynch, Werner Herzog, Jacques derridà, Paul Virilio, Giorgio Agamben,currently playing with the invention of a cinematic off-screen new Thing.

Camilla Boemio

Phot

os b

y G

ianp

aolo

Are

naCo

urte

sy o

f Mal

dive

s Pav

ilion

‘Happy Birthday’, Film, winner of 12 MFA Awards from the Maldives Film Festival 2011Courtesy the artists and Darkrain Entertainment – Installation view

21

Phot

os b

y G

ianp

aolo

Are

naCo

urte

sy o

f Mal

dive

s Pav

ilion

SAMA ALShAIbISILSILA

STATeMenT‘silsila’ is a visual and auditory feast for the senses. It weaves four video-scapes of the Arab desserts, water and oases with historical, cultural and geographic references to travel in the Maldives and larger Arab world. A central female protagonist guides viewers on their journey through the three videos pre-sented in small, black boxes, which lends an intimate quality to the vastness of the landscapes presented and issues of wa-ter wars and eco migrants that sama Alshaibi adroitly tackles. A fifth video, presented on the ground shows sand, feathers and candles rhythmically dance and transform from the out-line of the map of the travels of Ibn Battuta (whom stopped in the Maldives) into geometric patterns referencing traditional Islamic art and architecture and the, white, magnificent whirl of the sufi dervish. This fourth video is bookended between two glowing boxes, one on each side that shows an etched map of Ibn Battuta’s travels, presented under an installation representing the keel of a traditional Maldivian boat, the dhoni. Alshaibi’s comprehensive installation is serenaded by a haunting sound composition, which was commissioned for this work. As an Arab of Iraqi and Palestinian heritage whose work is often created directly in the region, Alshaibi’s ‘silsila’ mixed-media installation is presented within the context of the Maldives Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale

PROdUCTIOn CRedITSKeel fabricator: Michael Fadelsound: composed by Grey Filastine, featuring Brent Arnold (cello) and Abdel Hak (violin)

InTeRvIeWlAnd, WATeR, eXTInCTIOn: SHIFTInG THe COnveRSATIOn WITH SAMA AlSHAIBIBy Isabella Ellaheh Hughes

ISaBella ellaheh hugheS: What is the idea behind ‘silsila’?

Sama alShaIBI: When I started working on ‘silsila’ three years ago, I was interested in reconnecting shared identity through the desert ... a history of my people, my faith, from days of glory to our current warring and political reality. The sand, feathers and bodies of water in my work were symbols of entities that didn’t respect, nor would be confined to national borders that separate us from each other. But as time moved on while working in these forbidding spaces, I realized how in-tune and respectful one must be with the land, desert and water, to survive while working within them. As citizens of the earth, we have lost our respect for them; we perpetually rape the land for our own use. We are failing to comprehend the serious implications to our future and survivability should we continue on this course. so what began as a project about shared identity and commonality through the desert’s history, morphed into one that is ecologically motivated.The environment has become my passion and focus, because as we wage wars over oil, nationalism, religion and power, we are neglecting the very essential elements that can be detrimental to all, the loss of our natural recourses. In the Middle East and north Africa, it’s access to fresh water. For example, Israel and the settlements engage of a land grab of the West Bank to control and posses the water aquifers for their own citizens and the Bedouins across the region are giving up their nomadic traditions to move into cities because of the lack of water. Then there is the debate of the Maldives. Will they become an entire nation of eco-refugees, because of rising waters? These issues are linked to global misuse of our

28 29

uRSuLA bIEMAnndEEP WEAThER

STATeMenTUrsula Biemann (born 1955 in Zurich, lives in Zurich, works worldwide) is an artist, writer, and video essayist. Her practice is strongly research oriented and involves fieldwork and video documentation in remote locations. she investigates global relations under the impact of the accelerated mobility of peo-ple, resources and information and works the materials into multi-layered videos by connecting a theoretical macro level with the micro perspective on political and cultural practices on the ground. In the curatorial project ‘Geography and the Politics of Mobil-ity’ (2003), ‘The Maghreb Connection’ (2006) and her widely exhibited art project ‘sahara Chronicle’ (2006-2009) on clan-destine migration networks she made space and mobility her prime category of analysis. With ‘Black sea Files’ (2005), ‘Egyp-tian Chemistry’ (2012) and ‘deep Weather’ (2013) she shifts

the focus to natural resources and their situated materiality.

InTeRvIeW

THe POlITICO-AeSTHeTICS OF OIl And WATeR In URSUlA BIeMAnn’S vIdeO WORKSInterview with the artist by Andrew Pendakis, shanghai University of Finance and Economics.

Ursula Biemann interviewed by Andrew Pendakis,

Shanghai University of Finance and economics.

andrew aP: I want to begin by asking you a very general

question about the aesthetics of what we might call prima-

ry substances, those materials or liquids, like oil, water and

coal, which come to peculiarly mark or subtend the cultural

structure of an economy. I am interested particularly in those

substances which we are tempted to imagine vertically at

the bottom of things, the floorboards or groundwork of any

given historical period or locale. Both water and oil would ap-

Still from ‘Deep Weather’, 2013 Fields of tar sands of Alberta, Northern Canada

Video stills from ‘Noor’Courtesy of Ayyam Gallery and the artist

Installation views, ‘Silsila’Courtesy of Ayyam Gallery and the artist

40 41

STEFAnO CAgOLThE ICE MOnOLITh

STATeMenTWhat does it ask us? A monolith of ice of the Alps appeared in Venice along the shore in Riva Cà di dio during the Venice Biennale opening week and disappeared in a 72 hours melt-ing process, documented by a 72 hours video shooting. A 3 days public action, a Kubrickian metaphor questioning about the serious course that is affecting the planet. stefano Cagol himself, based in a village in the Alps and just back from proj-ects in the Arctic region, is witnessing the ongoing vanishing of the so-called eternal ice. Ice melts to water. The water of the monolith dissolving to the lagoon joins then billions and bil-lions of gallons of water that in the next decades risk to over-whelm the most sensitive areas of the globe. The Maldives is

one of the first, but also Venice. Alps and Maldives, ice and sun, so far but so close, connected by the same fate. Therefore, by the Pavilion, in the video installation ‘The Ice Monolith Fade’ high rocks islands emerge from water – or disappear into it. In fact the shooting realized by the lofoten islands seems to evoke an era (far in the past, and maybe again in the future) with the Alps overwhelmed.

stefano Cagol’s ‘The Ice Monolith’ performance starting on May 29th, 2013 at 8:00am has opened the Venice Biennale preview program. For more information: www.icemonolith-maldivespavilion.com

InTeRvIeWIn this platform, I invited more than 30 curators, writers and

researchers to try to answer to dilemmas triggered by ‘The Ice

Monolith’, my 72-hours-public-performance in Riva Cà di dio

during the opening week of the 55th Venice Biennale.

It is an extended interview I conceived involving a wide circle

of players – since sanskrit name of Maldives Mālā-dvīpa - liter-

ally meaning garland of islands – and choosing as questions

3 FAQ asked by the global mass to Google.com. Here the 3

questions:

1. How not to disappear? 

2. What is affecting the Earth? 

3. How does art influence society?

eric M. Wilcox, scientist of division of Atmospheric Sci-ence, desert Research Institute, Reno, nevada (USA):

1. The worst impacts, including total disappearance glaciers

and islands could be avoided by curbing emissions of green-

house gases. However a successful mechanism to achieve this

goal continues to elude mankind. However, access to energy

is fundamental to human wellbeing in the modern era, and societies both rich and poor continually seek the cheapest and easiest means of accessing it. Until non-fossil sources of energy become the cheapest and easiest to access for people around the world, we will not conquer this problem. This is no small feat.

2. The evolution of Earth is affected by factors external to Earth such as the energy from the sun and the gravitational attraction of the sun and moon. It is also affected by a myriad of internal processes such as Earth›s own gravity, vulcanism, biological and chemical processes ranging from global to mo-lecular in scale. And Earth›s evolution is now inexorably linked to the actions of mankind.

3. science can tell us what effects our actions have, but it cannot tell us whether the things we have lost or gained were worth it in the end. Art has the power to compel us to reflect on our own values. The challenge of the artists and storytellers is to help us understand what it is we value and to help us make those connections between our actions and their consequences for that which we truly care most about. 

50 51

Saverio Simi de Burgis, art critic and historian, professor of contemporary art history at Art Academy, venezia (I):3. In 2005, I participated at Where Art Worlds meet: Multiple Modernities and the Global salon, an international sympo-sium organized by la Biennale di Venezia, catalogue edited by Robert storr in Venice, 2007. I told my opinion about the Art phenomenon in our time: they recorded my words (pp. 126-127). The wrong thing was that the curator misunderstood them in particular concerning my quotation about two art historians, Josef strzygowski and Ananda Kentish Coomaras-wamy. But why I spoke about them? Because they are in a dif-ferent way the first art historians with not only an Eurocentric reference in their theories but already connected with other cultures and consideration of Art feeling which should now be useful to understand the phenomenon no in homologat-ing goals but applying definitely a comparative method and a real anthropological and social meaning.

lucia Barison, independent curator, Trento (I):1. Through art. Through translation and creative interpreta-tion of reality. Greeks, Etruscans and Egyptians, for example, sensed the power of art as timeless and alternative language comprehensible to everyone for its evocative power. To-day, after thousands of years, the products of those cultures have not disappeared but rather absorbed and reinterpreted through the art.

2. The earth is the surface on which every thing, every behav-ior and action driven by man or nature fall.

3. The art influences society in the same way in which society influences art.

Gianluca d’Incà levis, curator of dolomiti Contempora-nee, director of nuovo Spazio di Casso (I):1. And why shouldn’t we disappear? Everything vanishes, pre-tending to be eternal is puerile.

2. It is afflicted by man whose carelessness and homologous thinking is worse (and more vulgar) than concupiscence. There are too many people on the Earth and therefore too much stu-pidity. Poets, because of their own nature, remain a minority.

3. Art, most of the time, furnishes and decorates. In this case it influences society no more than a florist and even a gardener.

Alessandra Benacchio, independent curator, Bassano del Grappa (I):1. ‘l’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle,’ dante Alighieri, la divina Commedia

2. “Qualcuno che la sa lunga / mi spieghi questo mistero: / il cielo è di tutti gli occhi / di ogni occhio è il cielo intero. / ogni occhio si prende ogni cosa / e non manca mai niente: / chi guarda il cielo per ultimo / non lo trova meno splendente. / spiegatemi voi dunque, / perché il cielo è uno solo / e la terra è tutta a pezzetti” Gianni Rodari, Il cielo è di tutti

3. ‘If you treat an individual as he is, he will remain how he is. But if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be.’ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Maddalena Tomasi, architect, Trento & Francesca Bacci, curator, art critic and art historian at Mart Museum, Rov-ereto (I):1. The best way to achieve eternity is to be visible/retrievable on the web.

2. Ideas! We can mention climate change, the impact of con-sumerism on our planet, pollution, wars and a number of fac-tors that are involved in planetary changes. They all have one thing in common: they started as ideas. It is by thinking out-side of the box and starting from small changes that we can affect the “big picture.” And that is precisely what art can do. 

3. Recent neuro-scientific researches have demonstrated that our brain has an ongoing inner activity when we are not per-forming a specific task (‘default network’). This “inner state” in-fluences how a stimulus will be received, independently from the nature of the stimulus itself. Art can only meet us half way – we have to walk the other half – we influence art, art influence us, in an endless cycle of shaping and being shaped in return.

Michele Robecchi, musician, King Tongue, Milan. editor for contemporary art, Phaidon Press, london (I, UK):

Sound performance as part of ‘The Ice Monolith’. Platform, Maldives Pavilion, May 30, 2013, 5 pm. Playing Stefano Cagol’s MONOLITH GUITAR, 2013, hand crafted electric guitar, alder, maple, mahogany, 30 x 100 x 5 cm + snap-fit sculp-ture, wood, 100 x 30 x 60 cm

STATeMenT

‘The  disappearance’ uses large fields of flat solid color and

mixed media to capture a fleeting moment in our pulsating

memory and its influence on the soul. This visual experience

attempts to explore the consequences on the memory and

psyche of experiencing long periods of continuous change,

inconsistencies, anticipation and suppressed actions. The

absence of transparency, the inability to predict the next

moment and the emergence of various predictions has led

to many changes around us and inside us. In the end all are

human emotions and experiences. These variables have cre-

ated a great load on our memory let alone our mental abili-

ties to absorb or explain these changes. This visual sonata of

solid planes of form and color blended at times with gold leaf

or collage and using abstract figures that seems to perform

dramatically roles in a theatrical background. It is a study of

the influence of a certain incidence(s) on the human soul and

memory, more like scratches on the walls of our live memory.

In the past few years I have been much concerned with the

changing perceptions and the state of continuous social met-

WAEL dARWEShThE dISAPPEARAnCE

‘The disappearance’, 2013, 2 mixed media on canvas. Dimensions 300x200 cmCourtesy Artsawa gallery

54 55

STATeMenT Biennalist is an Art Format by Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel com-menting on  Biennales and other cultural managed events while they happen. often those events promote them selves with thematics and press releases faking their aim. Biennalist takes the thematics of the Biennales very seriously and test their pertiance on location. Artists have questioned for dec-

ade the canvas, the pigment, the museum... since 1989 we now question the Biennales. often Biennalist converge with Emergency Room artists providing a burning content that cannot wait  (today before it is too late). Biennalist can also activate the  Penetration Format, the  Critical Run Format  as well as Rumeur Art Format, the Fight debate Format, the slow dance Format, etc.

ThIERRy gEOFFREy AkA COLOnELIS CLIMATE ChAngE STILL An EMERgEnCy?

‘The disappearance’, 2013mixed media on canvas, 300x200 cmCourtesy Artsawa gallery

Phot

o by

Gia

npao

lo A

rena

Cour

tesy

Mal

dive

s Pav

ilion

58 59

khALEd hAFEzOn nOISE, SOund And SILEnCE

STATeMenT‘on noise, sound and silence’ proposes the island as meta-phor for the transience of memory, steadily submerged with the passage of time and loss of resolution in the mind. The visual and sculptural elements in this work evoke a poetic voyage through the black box of recollection, that repository of experience, nostalgia and travel that accumulates within oneself during the passage from childhood, into adolescence and adulthood. like islands sinking into the sea, time threat-ens with the slow extinction of those defining elements that make up the self. The fragility of the island is the fragility of memory.

‘on noise, sound and silence’ is created in two formats: three synchronized screens each with its individual audio track and in a single channel adaptation with a composite audio track. Both formats are accompanied by an installation of sculptural elements. The work addresses water in its different contexts: filmed across different geographic locations and free of any linear narrative, the footage tackles water as a source of life, communication and transportation but also of submersion and obliteration. All identifying elements of time and place have been removed. Instead the viewer is engulfed by water on all sides and encouraged to turn inwards in this highly syn-thesized personal landscape. The sound of the water mingles with the sounds of motors and fragments of conversation. other footage is filmed in urban communities nestling on shores, or around bays. These images of bustling societies by the sea are juxtaposed with images of large and silent, bod-ies of open water, evoking the landscape of their threatened disappearance, both physical and metaphorical.

The island thus becomes a symbol for cultural communities, even nations, marginalized by history and flooded by the force of new ideologies that threaten to erase multiplicity from view. It is personal and ideological space, a repository of those sacred moments that make up the identity of a com-munity, made all the more precious by their gradual disap-

pearance into the sea. As one island surrenders to the threat of fragmentation so new realities and islands are created to replace those that have been forever lost. Even the act of re-cording cannot stall the passage of time. The old camera, tar-nished and partially hidden in sand, reveals how the very act of recording memory is a transient one, destined to disappear with the sinking island.

The Memory Box consists of bronze pieces, each representing an indispensable object that is paramount in the completion of the virtual voyage.

The camera is a cast of my father’s camera. This is the 6x6 camera that he carried when I was a child. It looked like the 35 mm cameras. I still keep many family negatives in my archive. My father took pictures for me and for my mother brother and it stayed in function until I was fifteen years of age. The watch is a replica of my father’s watch; I used to borrow my father’s watch till I got my first watch at the age of eleven; a pickpocket robbed me of it one afternoon in dokki, a suburb of Cairo, while visiting my cousins. The shell is a similar to a shell that my grandmother used as an ashtray; she passed away when I was seven years old, and I do remember her vividly. My parents were both working and I spent most of my days with her in her large ground floor apartment and garden. My aunt –who was gorgeous and single-- used to smoke in hiding and stubs he cigarettes there; I was my aunt’s favorite child and the only one who kept her secret. The pebble is in fact a very small shell, it is a cast of a shell that I found in Alexandria when I was 15, and it stayed with me for 34 years. My uncle had a cabin on Roshdy Beach, a beach once for the bourgeoisie in Alexandria but now long since a public beach. The Coca Cola Bottle is a cast of the old shapes/forms of the bottles of the late sixties and early sev-enties; now back in fashion in the same size. Back then, as a child, Egypt adopted a soviet model of socialism, and the cola drinks were absolutely tasteless, but it was a bonus for us at the end of the hot day on the beach.

InTeRvIeWOn dISPlACeMenT, CHROMOSOMeS And BIG MACS: A TRIAlOGUevirtual conversation between Alexandra Seggerman, Omar donia and Khaled Hafez.

Omar dOnIa: ‘on noise sound & silence’, what a name! With seven solos in 2013 in seven cities, all projects with names like ‘Moving Forwards by the day’ (Meem gallery, dubai) and ‘Ber-lin Chromosome’ (naimah schutter Gallery, Berlin); you seem to entitle your projects in such a way since we were children. At the age of 42, and after 35 years, I can ask you why now.

Khaled haFez: Books, books and more books, I guess the start was like that. But as I grow older, I think traveling and writing added to this type of need to create a visual image with just a phrase. The power of the word is huge I think; I am a firm believer in the power of a word. You may contemplate: then why not write a book? I would argue: I published three, two

more in print, and two in the making. I think the word and the medium of text is getting to be an indispensable tool in the technical arsenal of the visual artist. I started drafting/script-ing on noise, sound & silence in Porto Allegre, Brazil in 2011. I did a smaller single channel version that explored briefly the notions of sound in several urban, maritime and indoor envi-ronments. I was quite happy with the work and planned to show it whenever the chance arose. For the 55th Venice Bi-ennale, I could not show it, as I wanted to create it as a site-specific piece that would express notions of personal memory and their fragility. I juxtaposed fading memories that exist on islets in the mind with physical islands that are threatened by the inevitable forces of nature. I worked on travel footage from my linear memory; footage shot in two Egyptian shore cities, Hong Kong, Manila, Porto Allegre, Male, Venice, Torino and dubai. The title of the work had to take you to those places.

aS: How did you select the works for these exhibitions? like for your last solo show Moving Forward by the day?

66 67

hEIdRun hOLzFEInd & ChRISTOPh dRAEgERTSunAMI ARChITECTuRE / ThE MALdIvES ChAPTER REdux

InTeRvIeWABdUllAH SHAHId, dIReCTOR OF dISASTeR MAnAGeMenT CenTeR Interviewed in Male, Maldives, 2011

draeger / hOlzFeInd: What was the effect of the tsunami on the Maldives?

aBdullah ShahId: The tsunami itself was a shock to the whole country. The day after, or two days after, the president was trying to explain the meaning of ‘tsunami’ on TV and ra-dio. 80 percent of our communication was completely cut off. no one knew what was happening in the islands. We did not have a response mechanism in place for such an event. There was nothing of a disaster-related methodology. The army and coastguard led the response and they did well considering the little resources that were available. Among the worst af-fected islands in the Maldives was Vilufushi,1 situated 187 km south of Male in the Thaa Atoll. There the waves were much higher than on islands in the north, for example. Two kids had to be brought down from a coconut tree, which is 30 ft. [ca. 9 m] high. When you go and look at the islands, you can just imagine what a 30 ft. high wave would do them …

d/h: Can you explain the specific situation of the island of Kandholhudhoo?

aS: The island of Kandholhudhoo [in Raa Atoll] was probably the smallest island with the largest population anywhere in the world, for sure in the Maldives. Close to 4,000 people were living there. Even before the tsunami, there was a plan to re-locate the population of Kandholhudhoo to a bigger island. The government held talks. It costs a huge amount of money

1 The entire island was flooded. Wave heights were reported at 2.0m on the eastern coastline and 0.5 m on the western coastline. There was extensive damage to majority of the properties. The island also suffered the heaviest casualties and fatalities in the Maldives.

to relocate a whole population. After the tsunami the govern-ment took advantage of the situation, to push for relocation. some of the islanders told me that people from the govern-ment came and told them that more waves were coming, so they didn’t want to stay there.

d/h: They spread rumors to break the resistance?

aS: It was deliberate to get them out. For the first few months nobody wanted to go but then the island of dhuvaafaru was selected… This was not a very good choice. It’s a beautiful is-land for tourists, for picnickers. But it’s not very big for a popu-lation of 4,000. now it’s almost full. What are we going to do ten years from now as the population increases? The IFRC, the International Federation of the Red Cross, did the reconstruc-tion there, building 600 houses, five community buildings and two schools. In december 2008, the entire population of Kandholhudhoo was relocated to dhuvaafaru. I would say the best houses in the country are now the reconstructed post-tsunami ones. The school in dhuvaafaru, for example, is very strong, big, and a safe shelter also. It’s a ‘safe school.’

d/h: Why is dhuvaafaru considered a ‘safe island’ compared to

the island that was abandoned?

aS: It was called a “safe island concept.” Just like dhuvaafaru,

Vilufushi, is also a safe island. It was made four times bigger

than the original island.2 It was rebuilt by denmark, and the

British Red Cross built 309 houses and schools. Because of

2 The original Vilufushi Island was a small, 15 ha. island, 800m long and 270m wide at its widest points, heavily urbanized, with a population density of over 100 people per ha., making it one of the most overcrowded islands in the Maldives. It was the first island developed to the specification of the safe island concept: all existing structures on the original island have been removed and new land has been reclaimed to make Vilufushi four times its original size. The entire island has been leveled to +1.4m above Msl. It is now essentially an artificial environment. Its natural coastal environment has been replaced completely with revetments and a harbor. source: UndP Maldives Report, december 2007

that, I would say: Vilufushi is a safer island – not a “safe island.”

dhuvaafaru is by no means safe, no. on the other hand they

got one of the first sewage systems in the islands and proper

electricity. The harbor is almost finished. But a safe island? no!

It’s a big joke. The health center was built just ten or 15 meters

from the beach.

d/h: You disapprove – who took these decisions?

aS: The government said this is how it should be done and

the Red Cross came and built the houses. They built them ac-

cording to their standards, which are good standards. But the

health center should have never been built there. Just one

year after the relocation of the people to the island, I had to

respond to an emergency at the island to protect the health

center from beach erosion. now, because of erosion, the

building is just three or four meters away from the beach. last

year we sent the coastguard and army engineers to make a

temporary arrangement. now it is protected but 15 houses

were under threat. Two houses were just one meter from

the beach… They were originally built just ten to 15 meters

from the beach, which is maybe normal for a small island. But

I must say, when there was so much funding available, we

could have done better planning and taken them to a bigger

island or at least an island with a bigger lagoon so there is

space for expansion.

d/h: Where did the people stay before they were moved to

dhuvaafaru?

72 73

hAnnA huSbERg, LAuRA MCLEAn & kALLIOPI TSIPnI-kOLAzACOnTIngEnT MOvEMEnTS ARChIvE

STATeMenTlandmasses have disappeared before. over thousands of years geologi-cal shifts and fluctuating sea levels have shaped migratory patterns and cultural evolution. But the complete disappearance of a nation state beneath the ocean is unprecedented, and the questions that arise in the face of this situation throw current international laws and issues of cultural continuity into disarray.

‘The Contingent Movements Archive’ seeks to unpack the problematics and possibilities of the anticipated submersion and dissolution of the Maldives, exploring these contingencies within a global context. online and at the pavilion, this speculative project draws together a wide range of perspectives, to map out potential migration scenarios for the perma-nently displaced population and its culture. The archive will be built up over the period of the Biennale, with critical input from the Contingent Movements symposium to be held at the pavilion over september 28th and 29th.

www.contingentmovementsarchive.com

Phot

os b

y G

ianp

aolo

Are

naCo

urte

sy o

f Mal

dive

s Pav

ilion

74 75

AChILLEAS kEnTOnIS & MARIA PAPACAhARALAMbOuS

MenTAl PARA-dICe [A COde FOR A MIRACle]by Maria Papacharalambous & Achilleas Kentonis

[Implementation of 3D animation: Babis Venetopoulos]

“Every thought emits a roll of the dice” Stéphane Mallarmé

our proposal works as a catalyst of reflection and discovery. It›s about a poetic, critical, aesthetic, philosophical and scien-tific stroll within space and time.

Through play and adventure it aims to retrieve hidden knowl-edge and forgotten truths (αλήθειες)*, thus bringing rela-tionships, communication, creation, even politics to a purely energeiac level. A nano-university as the alma matter of knowledge: where the awakening of mind and soul leads to “miracles”.

“If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, infinite”

William Blake

In this moment where we meet, this moment borrowed from eternity, this works as an invitation for reevaluating both our inner and outer world. It‘s a monument to human “sophia” (wisdom). A work that challenges us to open our hearts and minds, reminding us that even though we are in possession of infinite powers, we have very little time. An Arc of ancient and contemporary knowledge and wisdom which sym-bolizes our very own, consciousness-bound paradise... an alchemical space, as a playground that challenges us to re-remember our infinite potentials with Four “games/experi-ences” through Telekinesis, Telepathy, Augmented Real-ity and the Mystery of Water.

Science is a mode of conjecturing that allows us to reach temporary conclusions with regard to logic and knowledge, which are both “available” in the here and now. Art, on the other hand, is the sand on which we are allowed to build and destroy with infinite freedom, using as our pretext sometimes aesthetics, sometimes the idea.

This infinite freedom feeds our being and gives us the nec-essary space and leisure to alchemically bring together an amalgam of different kinds of knowledge, information and experience, and to visually think and create what language fails to articulate: aesthetics, physics, philosophy, psychology, mechanics, computer science, music.

“To develop a complete mind: study the science of art. study the art of science.

learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else”

Leonardo da Vinci

by maria Papacharalambous & achilleas Kentonis

“Who can boost me up like fate? Myself, riding on my back”

Tagore

‘Mental Para-dice’ is a conjectural artwork suggesting that by releasing the hidden knowledge which ventures upon an at-tempt to encapsulate paradise, together with its dominant abundance and freedom. It activates our anaesthetized per-ceptual capacity, s reassemble the forces of resistance against our personal hardships. Its an act against the reconciliation with the embodiment of our distress; an internal call, a volun-tary guidance of action, fuelled by the thirst of sensation; an endeavour to discover common grounds, a defence mecha-nism of adequacy and sufficiency, a trait that nourishes resil-

80 81

gREgORy nIEMEyERPOLARTIdE

STATeMenT‘Polartide’ is a translation of changing sea water levels into sounds. Visitors approaching the Pavillion  clearly hear sounds of bells ringing. The pitches of the bells change when sea water levels in 4 islands, including Gan (Maldives) change. Visitors on site and online trigger the bells ringing every time they check the sea water levels by pressing a button on the connected website (polartide.org). The result is a public soni-fication of sea water levels and the attention we pay to them. Additional data in the system tracks the stock prices of oil companies.

www.polartide.org

eSSAy

POlARTIde: FlOOdS OF dATA, FlOOdS OF TOneS

By: Julia Bryan-Wilson, 2013

What does catastrophe sound like? It could be an emergency alert siren howling its urgent alarm, or a low persistent rum-

ble accompanying a seismic shift. ‘Polartide’ — a participatory work created for the Maldives Pavilion at the 2013 Venice Bi-ennale by Greg niemeyer in collaboration with Chris Chafe,

Perrin Meyer, and Rama Gottfried-reminds us that the notes

of distress can also be melodic, as when chiming harbor buoy

bells are activated by roiling ocean waves. ‘Polartide’ utilizes

the digitized tones of buoy bells linked to sea levels (and the

corporate jingles of oil companies), not only to signal the

growing threat of global climate change, but also to encour-

age us to understand data in a new way — by listening.

For non-scientists like myself, data in the form of digits or

charts is often difficult to assimilate, so when ‘Polartide’ turns

numbers into sounds, this process of sonification invites differ-

ent kinds of interaction with raw bits of information. The year

2013 marks the first time that the small island nation of the

Maldives has been represented at the Venice Biennale, and its

inclusion signals an intensification of awareness about the po-

tential role of cultural policy regarding the environmental de-

struction of climate change. Curated by the collective Cham-

ber of Public secrets, the pavilion’s theme is ‘Portable nation,’

a reflection of the fact that the entire country is forecasted

to be under water in a matter of decades, and its population

might have to become ecological refugees, uprooted per-

manently from their doomed homeland in the Indian ocean.

Within the Biennale’s long history, many nations have used

it as a platform for publicity both negative and positive, and

the Maldives’s presence in Venice has been seen as way for it

Installation view of speakers attached to building exterior Photo: Perrin Meyer

Sea water level gauge at Port of Venice Sea Level Monitoring Station (VE19)

Photo: Greg Niemeyer

84 85

khALEd RAMAdAn In collABorAtIon WIth AbEd AnOuTIMALdIvES TO bE OR nOT

STATeMenT

Khaled Ramadan releases a debut for his documentary film

‘Maldives To Be or not’. Captured during his trip in March 2013,

Ramadan notes the parodies captured between Western cul-

ture and its long tradition of romanticizing the imagery of the

East. The Maldives today is wavering between the fiction of

the West and the reality of the East, and the islanders are at

the conjunction of Edward said’s theoretical duality “West

is Culture, East is nature”. In 2007 Maldives became the first

country to open an Embassy in second life, the online virtual world adding more confusion to the country’s fictional reality. Ramadan’s journey to the Maldives is about the East coming into its own. He meets the Maldivian community, the dhivehi people, which means “the islanders”, not as an anthropologist, colonialist or journalist, but as a citizen of the Arab world who wants to learn about what’s left of the shared history and how this amphibious nation is treating its contemporary culture in relation to its ecological strengths and weaknesses.

InTeRvIeWKHAled RAMAdAn (KR) InTeRvIeW SWedISH GeOlOGIST nIlS-AXel MöRneR (nAM), FORMeR CHAIRMAn OF THe InTeRnA-TIOnAl COMMISSIOn On SeA level CHAnGe.An Interview and debate About the Measure of Sea level Change and Sea level ethics in the Maldives

BACKGROUndIn recent years, sea level research has become an issue of con-troversy. Instead of being the reason of different interpretations of available data, it has become the reason of the respective au-thors personal relation to the concept of global warming.The Maldives is an island nation in the Indian Ocean. It consists of some 1,200 low islands arranged in some 20 larger atolls and have been inhabited for the last 1,500 – 2,000 years. Like any coastal nation the Maldives have constantly been under the threat posed by great waves during extreme storms or, even worse, during tsunami events. In the past 4,000 years, the Mal-dives has experienced several short-term sea level highs. In the media, we read about the Maldives as either a ‘paradise’ for tourists, or as the nation soon to disappear by rapidly rising sea levels as a consequence of global warming.Nils-Axel Mörner, scientist and former chairman of the Interna-tional Commission on Sea Level Change, made three major ex-peditions to the Maldives and launched several research projects. According to the summaries of his research, the Maldives con-trary to popular belief is not sinking and does not appear ready to disappear any time soon. In his report, Mörner came across several pseudo scientific reports that suggested the Maldives was well on its way to flooding and annihilation. According to his report, ‘2500 scientists cannot be wrong.’ What Mörner found most surprising was that very few - if any at all – conducted proper sea level investigations were into the area, basing their findings on a series of assumptions. This meant that none of the 2,500 scientists cited in Mörner’s re-port had actually ever been to the Maldives and none of them were even true sea level specialists.In his Maldives report Nils-Axel Mörner said, ‘when I, as expert re-viewer, reviewed the sea level chapter of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment (2001), I was struck that none of the 33 authors was a sea level specialist’ (INQUA, 2000). Therefore, this chapter was not a product of the interna-

tional sea level community but rather of selected persons who had ‘the correct belief’ and hence could be expected to provide the answer suited their purposes (today we may call this ‘sea-level-gate’). According to Mörner, the former President of the Maldives, Mohamed Nasheed, entered the scene in 2009 with very firm statements regarding his nation. Nasheed vociferously repeated again and again that the Maldives was drowning in the ocean, and with noticeable ‘not to say “exhibitionistic’ official ac-tions like standing in the sea saying ‘we are drowning’ or having a submarine cabinet-meeting to illustrate the flooding to come.Mörner believes the reason behind the former president’s fixation on the rising sea level concept is economical, and certainly not scientific. From the previous president he inherited the idea that ‘the West’ would provide extensive economical support to their ‘drowning nation’ because it was the fault of their overuse of CO2 producing industrial activities, and, indeed, a lot of money has since ‘flooded’ into the nation, as Mörner points out in his Mal-dives report.

Khaled ramadan: I should thank you dr. nils-Axel Mörner for taking the time to talk to us about your valuable and informa-tive reporting on the Maldives. First of all I would like you to know that I am not a climatologist like you and I don’t have substantial scientific knowledge about the environment. I am an aesthetician and my approach to environmental changes the world is facing is relatively theoretical. But you seem to be a prominent global voice on the issue of sea level changes, so where do we start?

nIlS-axel mörner: I have a strong position there. There are good people out there, but so far no one could beat me yet. I have been working on it for 40 years and I have launched almost all the important theories during this period of time. And in the Maldives, which is a fantastic region with wonder-ful people, I came there not at all to address this question of whether the sea level is rising or not rising. I came there be-cause it’s a place where you could see sea level variables in a way, which you can’t do in other areas of the world. Very rapidly we understood that we had an interesting discovery that the sea had not been rising in the Maldives for the last 50 years at least. I made a TV show with Male TV that came out very nice and I thought the government should be happy when somebody is telling them that the sea is not rising, but they got very upset and I was nearly accused of anti-govern-

96 97

OLIvER RESSLERFOR A COMPLETELy dIFFEREnT CLIMATE

STATeMenT‘For A Completely different Climate’ deals with an emerging social movement that questions and selectively fights the response (or non-response) of states and corporations to climate change. This leftist movement has the potential to mobilize especially in Britain, where in August 2008 a Climate Camp was organized to close the Kingsnorth coal-fired power station east of london. Although the Kingsnorth station has been shut down, the en-ergy corporation E.on plans to build, at the same location, a new coal-fired power station that will assure profits for the

next few decades. This project completely conflicts with the necessary goal of reducing Co2 emissions. Preventing a new coal-fired power plant in Kingsnorth is of great symbolic value, since a successful resistance could mean the end of other planned projects for coal fired power plants elsewhere in Britain. ‘For A Completely different Climate’ is a 3-channel slide installation in Venice shown on one monitor based on photos taken in the Climate Camp and at the demonstrations and blockades of Kingsnorth, combined with short texts and audio recordings of the demonstrations and workshops.

InTeRvIeW

APPROACHeS AGAInST THe FOSSIl FUel FUndAMenTAlISM

An interview with Oliver Ressler by dorian Batycka (and

an intervention by Mike Watson)

dOrIan BatyCKa: Your film that will be presented later this

september as part of the Maldives Pavilion for 55th Venice

Biennale, entitled ‘leave It in the Ground’  is not the first of

your works that deal with climate change. other projects in-

cluding ‘For A Completely different Climate’ (2008), ‘100 Years

of Greenhouse Effect’ (1996), and ‘sustainable Propaganda’

(2000) all comment on the contemporary discourse of climate

change. What do you hope to achieve with leave it to the

Ground, and how does it differ from your other projects per-

taining to climate change and ecological crises?

OlIver reSSler: ‘leave It in the Ground’ is based on a nar-

ration I am writing, drawing a line between global warming

and uprisings, how disastrous weather conditions lead to the

emergence of movements in various places, how old orders are

toppling and open up possibilities that could lead to long-term

social and political transformations, both good and bad. The

film—which imagery was in part recorded in the seemingly

idyllic landscape of the lofoten archipelago in norway—dis-

cusses climate crisis not as a technical problem, but as a politi-

cal problem. To compare this work with three previous works

is quite a task, as all of them are different and related to very

specific contexts at the times they were produced. 100 Years of

Greenhouse Effect (1996) is a series of digital prints that relate

to the first scientific proof of the existence of an anthropogenic

climate change in 1896 through the swedish scientist svante

Arrhenius. In my work Arrhenius’ scientific text was intertwined

with a critique on the dominant discourse dealing with global

warming 100 years later, the technocratic concept of “sustain-

able development” launched in a book by the Wuppertal Insti-

tute for Climate, Environment, and Energy in 1996. sustainable

Propaganda confronts the same discourse on the occasion

of the world fair in Hannover in Germany in 2000, which at-

tempted to popularize ‘sustainable development’ for a mass-

audience. ‘For A Completely different Climate’ (2008) finally

focuses on a newly emerging climate movement in the UK.

dB: Could you expand a little on why you decided to make ‘leave It in the Ground’ now, how you structured it?

Or: Today it is even more urgent to deal with the issue of global warming than 17 years ago, when I did my first piece focusing on global warming. Among scientists who take themselves serious it is not being discussed any more that global warm-ing exists. But it is also clear today that the international trea-ties such as the Kyoto Protocol completely failed to achieve the required reduction of carbon dioxide emissions. They es-tablished an international emissions trading system that cre-ated a new market, but did not reduce emissions. My guess is that the current capitalist system won’t be able to reduce carbon emissions to the required level; it will only react where it is necessary to guarantee the maintenance of the system, which does not necessarily imply that a basis of existence will be provided for all people on the planet—as it is already the case nowadays. The enormous environmental disasters in the recent years did not lead to a reduction of the emissions that are responsible at least in part for these disasters; the reac-tion was that the countries in the Global north encapsulate themselves, militarize border control, build walls to keep away migrants, who to a growing extent also migrate because their living conditions got destroyed in their countries of origin. of course global warming is not the only cause for migration; the catastrophic impacts Free Trade has e.g. for peasants in the Global south is another central reason.

dB: The notion of sustainable development and green energy is a concept that strongly resonates with many environment activists and campaigners, but more recently those such as Bill Mckibben from 350.org have called for forms of divest-ment from carbon producing companies, and the need to create political economic models independent from domi-nant hegemonic energy interests. What role do you feel does political economy have in addressing climate change and global warming?

Or: In my opinion the main task today is to combine the dis-cussion of climate change with the discussion of a need of a change of the economic and political system. Keeping intact the existing global power relationships but just introducing a bit of renewable energy resources won’t be sufficient. A mo-

102 103

kLAuS SChAFLERhACkIng ThE FuTuRE PLAnET

‘Hacking the Future and Planet’ focuses on the ambivalent character of large-scale interventions in the global climate system, technologies that “hack the planet” to slow or even reverse our civilizations’ impact on the climate and environ-ment to counter climate change. These Geoengineering tech-nologies involve sci-fi like concepts such as seeding clouds to be whiter and reflect more sunlight back into space, or erect-ing carbon capturing artificial trees. Manipulations of regional weather situations attempt to create artificial rain, change the paths of hurricanes, or guarantee sunshine for political ap-pearances at military parades. like they said in the Cold War: ‘who controls the weather controls the world.’ on a local level,

geoengineering also include modifications like huge dikes that could possibly prevent the Maldives, Venice or new York, all three at risk of flooding due to global warming and rising sea levels, of their somewhat similar destinies. However, the side effects of these constructions, as well as of other geo-engineering laboratory experiments or field tests, on natural and cultural habitats are unpredictable and pose numerous ethical and geopolitical questions potentially pushing post-colonial conflicts: Who should decide or govern if the applica-tion of geoengineering technologies would be legitimate and suitable to save the nature of unique places for humanity and above all for their local populations?

‘Hacking the Future and Planet’, 2013Details Installation

110 111

PATRIzIO TRAvAgLIPAnThEISTIC – POLIFACETIC

STATeMenTPatrizio Travagli is working on the memory of disappearance. Building a tower of over 500 mirrors, ‘Pantheistic-Polifacetic’ – he creates fragments of reflections freestanding in a public space, only there to be taken away by passer-by’s. In this pro-cess of elimination, are there instructions on the back of the mirrors, requesting for the ‘participator’ to take a photograph of the reflection they seek to capture as their ‘own memory’ and send it back to the assigned email address which will then load all the information captured by the indigenous unknown and electronically collect and save all the histories developed from this fragment of a mobile light-sensitive surface.

An idea founded by a group of excessive cut glass,  Patrizio Travagli realizes the notion of consumption, waste, reflection

and disappearance with mirrors. Working on the memory of disappearance, he builds a low leveled facade of approximate-ly 490 mirrors, creating fragments of reflections in the corner of a room that can either be seen or unseen from its disguise. The bricked walls carry their reflections into the ground, as though its hidden depths continued through the floor only to realize it is a likeness to what already exists. 

In this interactive medium, the spectators are asked to take a layer of mirror, and contribute their own notions of reflec-tions. That personal reflection is photographed and reserved in a photo medium that is transferred onto a blogsite where people can see their reflections virtually only to archive what was once there, and now gone. 

‘Pantheistic - Polifacetic’, 2013Installation view Courtesy Edward Cutler Gallery, Milano (Italy),Tayloe Piggott Gallery, Jackson, WY (USA)

116 117

WOOLOOMALdIvIAn COCOnuTS (CAPRICCIO)

Wooloo has moved a crop of fresh Maldivian coconuts from a local palm tree to the canals of Venice. Each of the palm’s twelve coconuts will be placed in a distinct site determined by twelve classical ‘Vedutismo’ paintings of the Venetian city-scape. during the biennial, the coconuts will spread through-out the city on the currents of the water, noticed only by passers by who stumble across them. A small, out-of-place element inserted into one sinking civilization from another, the coconuts serve as a reminder of both the resilience and fragility of nature. Featured on the nation’s official Emblem, as well as on countless guidebook covers, hotel brochures, and tourist photographs, the coconut palm is not only the na-tional Tree of the Maldives, but a major element of the island nation’s visual culture. The coconut and Maldivian life is es-sentially inseparable. Yet the image of coconuts in the water is also an image of destruction: following the last tsunami to hit the Maldives, the vast number of coconuts floating in the water was a major sign of ruin. When rising seas eventually submerge the Maldives, its coconuts will bear witness to its last days. Floating away like pieces of memory, the dnA of an extinct time.

eSSAydRIFTInG In PlACe: WOOlOO’S ‘MAldIvIAn COCOnUTS (CAPRICCIO)’ AT THe 55TH venICe BIennAle

A coconut floats past on the greyish water of the Grand Canal. It’s bright green, entirely out of place – that’s why you notice it.or else, more likely, you don’t notice it at all. Twelve Maldivian coconuts drift along the canals of Venice, largely unnoticed, oc-casionally glimpsed by passerby. That’s the difficulty in writing about Wooloo’s work for the Maldives Pavilion at the 55th Ven-ice Biennale: I have not actually seen it. or rather, I haven’t seen any of the coconuts: the work extends beyond the visible proof of Wooloo’s small, elegant gesture, encapsulating the often im-perceptible shift it instigates within the Venetian landscape.For ‘Maldivian Coconuts (Capriccio)’ (2013), the danish artist group has taken these twelve coconuts (the crop of one tree) from the Maldives and released them into the canals of Venice at various locations resembling views from classical vedutismo paintings. during the Biennale, the coconuts spread through-out the city on the currents of the water, noticed only by those who happen to stumble across them. A small, incongruous el-ement inserted into one sinking civilization from another – a Maldivian coconut in Venice prompts a reconsideration of one’s surroundings. Imparting a sense of placelessness and transi-ence, the work suggests both the endurance and fragility of the natural world.At the center of the work, the coconut itself is a major aspect of life in the Maldives, both practical and symbolic. Coconuts are a staple food for Maldivians; the coconut palm is the national tree, and its image is featured in much of the nation’s visual culture: on the official emblem as well as on countless guide-book covers, hotel brochures and tourist photographs, evi-dence of the huge tourist industry (which accounts for roughly one third of the Maldives’ GdP). As a species, the coconut has spread throughout the world by floating across the oceans to new destinations. Coconuts are so well-suited to sea travel that they can drift thousands of kilometers and still stay fresh. once washed ashore, the coconut can sprout a new tree from the

high concentration of nutrition encapsulated in its core. Each coconut is the seed of life – a small portable nation, sustaining itself despite harsh conditions.Yet the image of coconuts in the water is also an image of destruction: following the last tsunami to hit the Maldives, in 2004, the vast number of coconuts floating in the water was a major sign of ruin, of the tangible devastation wrought by cli-mate change. If rising seas eventually submerge the Maldives, its coconuts will remain, small reminders of its past existence. The coconuts floating through Venice are simultaneously em-blematic of nature’s resilience and its capacity for destruction. In this sense, Wooloo’s piece can also be read as a preemptive elegy to the small, almost unnoticed island nation.‘Maldivian Coconuts (Capriccio)’ is in dialogue with both Venice and the Maldives, revealing parallels between these two quite different locations: both are deeply affected by climate change, and – unless significant action is taken –  will likely be sub-merged by surrounding waters in the near future. Both, more-over, are dependent upon a tourism industry which sustains the national economy while steadily depleting resources and destroying the natural environment. Venice today is sinking, a result of rising water levels due to climate change as well as extensive industrial construction in the mid-twentieth century; parts of the city flood weekly. In the Maldives, the situation is even more precarious: as sea levels rise catastrophically (58 cm by the end of this century, according to a Un estimate), the island nation, only 2.3 meters tall at its highest point, is at risk of disappearing into the Indian ocean. The Maldivian people may well be some of the first victims of climate change as a nation, and some have raised the possibility of relocating the Maldives – first from the most at-risk islands to other parts of the coun-try, but eventually as a sovereign nation recreated within an existing state, such as India or sri lanka. Hence the Pavilion’s conception of a ‘portable nation’: the imminent threat of dis-placement due to climate change raises questions about the stability of the Maldivian people and culture, and about what constitutes a nation.‘Maldivian Coconuts (Capriccio)’ echoes, moreover, the Mal-dives Pavilion’s theme of ecological romanticism – a poetic ex-ploration of shifting conceptions and constructions of nature in the face of catastrophic climate change. It reflects an approach to nature as a concept – constructed, shaped by human needs and ideas – but also as an intuited space, composed of emo-tional environments. This, then, is the double grief of climate change, to which ‘Maldivian Coconuts (Capriccio)’ speaks: its horrific concrete effects – starvation, mass homelessness, the

extinction of native species – but also placelessness, dislo-cation, the profound sense of loss in having one’s home de-stroyed or disappear irrevocably.At the same time, the work considers the history of Venice as the first center of international trade, the point of origin in the process of global capitalist exchange – the process which systematically exploits and devastates the natural world. In a sense, the coconuts’ random paths through the canals and be-yond, perhaps into the surrounding seas, trace the pathways of goods and capital through Venice in past centuries. Moreover, the twelve coconuts were released at sites in the city resem-bling those that were depicted by 18th century vedutisti, paint-ers of Venetian cityscapes. These twelve image-sites situate ‘Maldivian Coconuts (Capriccio)’ within the local visual history of Venice, and link the piece to Italian art historical tradition. The work’s connection to the vedute tradition also suggests a relationship between residents and outsiders, given the popu-larity of these paintings as souvenirs for European travelers on a Grand Tour, and of Venice – then and now, and especially dur-ing the Biennale – as a tourist destination. Vedute paintings are “a phenomenon inextricably linked to place.”

121

PArAllel Projects

122 123

MIcro-MAcro AreA: FROM ThE IndIAn OCEAn TO ThE AdRIATIC And FROM ThE MALdIvES TO ThE MARChE

From the Indian ocean to the Adriatic and from the Maldives to the Marche, the seminar at the Politecnica University of the Marche provides an in-depth cross section of issues related to climate change combining the voices of teachers, marine re-searchers, and the Australian artists Josephine starrs and leon Cmielewski, previewing the first ever Maldives Pavilion part of the 55th Venice Biennale.

over the two days of the conference due to the greetings of the rector Marco Pacetti, associate curator of the Maldives Pa-vilion Camilla Boemio, as well vice-president of the Regional Council, will follow the insights of the various speakers: Carlo Carboni of department of social sciences (sociologist), Ani-ello Russo of department of life and environmental sciences of Polytechnic University of Marche (oceanographer), Paolo Galli-of department of Biotechnology and Biosciences of Bi-cocca University of Milan (Marine Biologist), and the marine biologist Massimo Boyer.

All the topics analyzed deal with the incompatible elements characteristic of a double vision: the macro water masses around world (oceania, Indian ocean, Atlantic ocean, Pacific

ocean) within the context of the Marche district located in Adriatic sea and around Italy.

An ‘incompatible element’ is a term in geochemistry used to describe mineral properties in rare earth and in the oil industry. ‘The elements’ also refer to weather forces produc-ing effects that are becoming more and more incompatible with human life. starrs and Cmielewski tell stories on behalf of future ‘climate refugees’ as part of their ongoing concern with migration stories. They use data maps to reveal the poli-tics of forced migration due to conflict over resources such as diamonds, titanium and oil. Incompatible Elements also rec-ognizes the largely unquantified human migration resulting from climate change—of people often seen as incompatible with national immigration policies. As philosopher Bruno la-tour urges, the artists recognize that ecological issues include the social, political and cultural as opposed to perpetuating the Modernist ‘human/nature’ divide.

venue unIvPm – università Politecnica delle marche Curated by Camilla Boemio

124 125

PAUl MIller AKA dj sPooKyThE TIdE And TARIFF InITIATIvE: MALdIvES AdAgIO

STATeMenT‘Tide and Tariff’ is a project for the Venice Biennale Maldives Pavilion based on oceanic studies of the currents that sur-round the Maldives atolls. The Maldives is a nation consisting of 26 natural atolls, comprising 1192 islands. Paul d. Miller is the first Artist in Residence at The Metropolitan Museum, and was inspired by the museum’s oceanic collection to explore some of the linkages between the production of physical art objects and what Miller calls ‘data aesthetics.’ He took several studies of the ocean currents around the Maldives Atolls and turned them into sonic data.

126 127

ehsAn FArdjAdnIyAPIRATE CInEMA

STATeMenT‘Pirate Cinema’ knows no copyrights, fights for autonomy and works directly with artists, filmmakers and  musicians. ‘Pirate Cinema’ is involved in the programming of events and develops concepts for multi-media mobile stages with sustainable energy installations.  In 2010 we started in Amsterdam with a dIY recycled machine, a five wheels bike for three people to move forwards and produce electricity. This year we build a ‘Pirate Cinema’ dome with surround sound and full dome projection.

For the 55th Venice Biennale ‘Pirate Cinema’ has been invited to devolve its energy engagement to the Maldives cause with a customized and  optimized version of mobile stage design that suits the city architecture and it’s urban culture. The main issue of portable nations and disappearance as a work in progress was thus represented through a performative in-terpretation and series of public screenings of ecologically conscious short films.

For more information: www.piratecinema.nlFacebook: www.facebook.com/Pirate.Cinema

PIRATe CIneMA CReWArtistic director, producer and head of programming: Ehsan Fardjadniya

Artistic co-director, coordinator of programming: Amir Tirandaz

Film programming for Maldives event: Miriam De Rosa, Heath Iverson

128 129

MArIAn tUBBsOPEn MOdEL FOR An AFFECTIvE LAndSCAPE, vIRTuAL bECOMES REAL WhEn nECESSARy

STATeMenT‘open model for an affective landscape’, virtual becomes real when necessary is a 100% non-organic meditation on virtual simulations of natural ecologies by artist Marian Tubbs. The fictive documentary makes suggestion to dwelling in virtual landscapes as a call forwarding to the death of nature. The Internet sourced imagery and sound-bites have been ani-mated into a moving landscape ranging from crude cutups to dreamy vistas where exotic animals call out to the senses. The content problematizes intellectual property and thinks through the concept of ersatz nature.

The work offers a meditation on the seductive appeal of the luxuriant, often-exotic virtual landscapes that can be found on the Internet. For Tubbs, these simulated environments are symptomatic of a contemporary culture of isolation and escapism, where people choose to enjoy recreation time in online paradises rather than confront or even acknowledge today’s ecological challenges.

dr maud Jacquin

130 131

rAvI AGArWAl, cAMIllA BoeMIoAnd Khoj InternAtIonAl ArtIsts AssocIAtIons WorKshoPsRE-TERRITORIALIzIng ECOLOgIES

STATeMenTEcology has been presented as a homogeneous term with the image of our fragile planet portrayed as a uniform sphere of action and activity. However, the current ecological crisis, which encompasses forests, biodiversity, climate change, toxicity, land use, GM foods, etc., has roots in the histories of colonization, progress and development. local knowledge, cultures, and relationships have often been submerged into dominant ideas that have shaped community relationships and geographies.

Eco-aesthetics, in response to this, has linkages in social po-litical landscapes, anthropogenic and animistic concerns, and could even challenge the category of ‘nature’ itself.

Engaging with these ideas through artistic practices can help recover multiple ecologies and possibly rethink ideas of ‘pro-gress’ and even reshape them.

seminar featuring: navjot Altaf, Amar Kanwar, Ravi Agarwal, Prof. Vikram soni, Camilla Boemio and Ravi sundaram (mod-erator).

Ravi Agarwal‘After the flood serie’

2010

Detail, Ravi Agarwal,‘Dislocation Site’, 2010

Courtesy Ravi Agarwal/Gallery Espace

Khoj programmes, in new dehli, have nurtured vibrant imagi-nations and created unconventional synapses between art and disciplines such as science, architecture and fashion, with a focus on building networks, developing alternative peda-gogies and learning through collaboration and exchange. Moreover, Khoj facilitates change by encouraging artists and audiences to engage with vital concerns such as ecology, sus-tainability and community participation.

Though a variety of programmes including workshops, resi-dencies, exhibitions, talks and community art projects, Khoj has supported the experimentation of many leading Indian artists before their international acclaim. over 200 Indian and 400 International Artists from countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Uganda, Kenya, Turkey, Pakistan, Japan, China, Indonesia, sri lanka, south Africa, Zimbabwe, Thailand, Korea, UK, Ger-many, France, Mexico and America have been through Khoj.

132 133

celeste PIMMRESOnAnT zEnITh

STATeMenT‘Resonant Zenith’ is a sonic and sculptural interplay with bur-geoning environmental crisis presented for two sinking lands. Centralizing around the subtle phenomena of rising water levels, this inconspicuous development is brought into the forefront of perception through sensory translation. Water washing onto a Venetian shore is mechanically transformed into tolls of bells by wood constructions. This transformation of data allows a new manifestation for cogitating rising water levels.  

like a horizon, reference frames rotate around incidental points of observation. Climate change denial can manifest as a subconscious development reinforced by the unapparent environmental deterioration that cannot be properly grasped. By altering the conception of the subtle phenomenon of ris-ing water levels, ‘Resonant Zenith’ provides a striking alterna-tive to crisis-blindness. Every toll of a bell acts as a clear warn-ing that the water level has risen. Every toll is a cue for the human psyche to reconstruct feelings towards the reality of necessity.

Positioned within the public sphere, this project acts as an eco-aesthetic and publicly engaged monument stationed in the Giardini and waterfront in Venice. Unsanctioned by city officials, the wooden mechanisms additionally illuminate the symbolic qualities of warnings. often appearing as an unin-vited critique, equally so as the wrath of nature’s degrada-tion, cautioning is often unyielded. Though now ringing to the attention of all in proximity, this specific warning may be silenced by political liability. All is contingent on the obser-vations of governors of the ecological sphere. Blindness and indifference may impair the horizon, but for now all rings clear - if we listen.  

134 135

MArK dAhl(unTITLEd) SERIOuS gELATO PERFORMAnCE(unTITLEd) COAL buRnIng AT ThE vEnICE bIEnnALE

Mark dahl’s performative interventions took the form of ephemeral actions both inside and outside the Venice Biennale. His counter-aesthetic methodology is at once informed by cultural theory and leftist radical politics, imbued with an underlying sense of antagonism that harkens back to the ideas of dematerialization and institutional critique.

136 137

olIver ressler LEAvE IT In ThE gROund

STATeMenTIn recent years, countless extreme weather events clearly in-

dicate that climate change is not only a future phenomenon

but is already taking place. some effects of global warming—

desertification, more frequent droughts, less frequent but

more intense precipitation, lower crop yields—inflame exist-

ing social conflicts. In the Global south, climate change ag-

gravates the crises of poverty, violence, and unrest that result

from the legacies of colonialism and late neoliberal capital-

ism. This vicious circle fuels humanitarian crises and civil wars

that amplify political, economic and environmental disasters.

despite clear warnings, the ruling powers do not have a politi-

cal agenda with a serious strategy to reduce use of fossil fuels,

the main cause of global warming. A fossil-fuel fundamental-ism seems to dominate throughout the globe. Recently, some of norway’s politicians have advocated extracting petroleum in one of the largest fish and aquatic life spawning grounds on the planet, the sea encircling the lofoten archipelago. The deepwater drilling would have unpredictable effects on the fish populations and some of the world’s cleanest waters. With the idyllic landscapes of the lofoten archipelago as its back-ground, ‘leave It in the Ground’ describes the climate crisis not as a technical and scientific problem, but as a political problem. The film discusses how ecological and humanitarian disasters caused through global warming might topple old orders and open up possibilities that could lead to long-term social and political transformations, both positive and negative.

138 139

MIKe WAtsonJOAn OF ART

STATeMenTVenice, Italy – ‘Joan of Art’ – Towards a Free Education in col-laboration with Maldives Pavilion presents  sos sauna Boat 20-24 november, Gervasuti Foundation.The homogenization of learning and accreditation modes re-alized through the ‘Bologna Process’ accords with a marketiza-tion of education across Western Europe which threatens the diversity of subjects on offer as vocational subjects and those which lean towards the project of rationality become priori-tized in terms of funding and resources.The Venice Process – started at Gervasuti Foundation, in col-laboration with the national Pavilion of the Maldives during the 55th Venice Biennale – aims at offering an alternative education and accreditation system offered by a network of international art institutions.Events – including performances, seminars and workshops – will span the Biennale, culminating in the writing of a free course in art and ecology – written in conjunction with the Maldives Pavilion and a group of international artists and aca-demics– and the delivery of a conference on accreditation systems in november 2013.simultaneously, a boat is being recycled and modified to run on ecofuel and incorporate a sauna by artists Harold de Bree, laut Rosenbaum and nick Tulinen in collaboration with arti-sans from Castello, a zone with a rich history of craftsmanship. This will be used as a case study for the aforementioned free course and will appear at various locations across Venice.An ongoing collaboration between Jaakko Mattila and Antti Tenetz, Body of Water will use feeds, recorded samples, envi-ronmental sensors, dIY microscopes and prerecorded visuals from Finland collating the movement of water from various sources. This data will be relayed specifically to various venues internationally and documented simultaneously using an

online map / blog / responsive website. Body of Water will be first showcased at the 55th Venice Biennale in collaboration with ‘Joan of Art’ and the Maldives Pavilion, at various loca-tions during the finissage. Worm Foundation of Rotterdam will present a series of work-shops on education as part of their Parallel University, whilst Venice based Feldenkrais instructor Paolo Camia will curate an intervention based on horizontal education and movement. 

ABOUT JOAn OF ART‘Joan of Art’: Towards a Free Education system starts from the very basis of what education is: the sharing of information. This project – founded in 2012 in residence with nomas Foun-dation – explores the very notion of education, so that a new system can be delivered through the recognition of the value of sharing knowledge between peers and across disciplines. The final goal of ‘Joan of Art’ is to set up a free accredited sys-tem in such a way that it can be delivered from anywhere in the world, growing and changing organically as it disperses via accessible communication platforms.

For more information: www.joanofart.net

140 141

josePhIne stArrs And leon cMIeleWsKI InCOMPATIbLE ELEMEnTS

STATeMenTIf the earth beneath of our feet could speak…’Incompatible Elements,’ a project by Australian artists Josephine starrs and leon Cmielewski, re-presents the relationship between na-ture and culture by reconfiguring land as active rather than neutral, verbal rather than mute, and therefore able to com-ment directly on the impacts of climate change. Building on the long tradition of artists combining text and image to com-municate ideas and concepts, poetic texts are digitally em-bedded into satellite images of landscapes in crisis.

In each digital print and video these texts reveal themselves dynamically, growing out of the landscape in different ways – the text design and method reveal the reflecting qualities of the landscape.

‘Tipping Point’ responds to the issues of climate change in ways that are mythical, biblical and chemical. The video illus-trates the Boiling Frog story that has been used by environ-mentalists to describe the physical state of humanity in rela-tion to ignoring the early effects of global warming.

‘Maldives Match-Up’ is a participatory mapping project that invites visitors to map their own city block onto an existing Maldive island, offering displaced Maldivians an opportunity to relocate.

leon Cmielewski is a senior lecturer at the University of West-ern sydney.

This project was assisted by a grant from Arts nsW through the national Association for the Visual Arts (nAVA).

‘Satellite’ photographs series

‘Tipping Point’, Digital Video, 5”

Phot

o by A

ndre

a Pan

arell

i Co

urte

sy M

aldive

s Pav

ilion

142 143

ProvIsÕes (ProvIsIons)bOOk LAunCh

Water. Coltan. Carbon. oil. Air. lithium. Fish. Rice. land. Gold. These raw materials, extensively extracted and harvested to-day, are of central concern to World of Matter, an international research project, which will be launched as a multi-media web-platform in fall 2013. World of Matter is a collaborative endeavor that brings together artists, architects, and photo-journalists who have worked extensively on resources, global-ization, and spatial politics, with theorists from the fields of geography, art history and cultural theory.

The book ‘Provisões’ (Portuguese/English) compiles texts and visual materials produced by the group and several Brazil-ian guest speakers for its inaugural public symposium in April 2012. Held in Belo Horizonte within the Brazilian min-ing state of Minas Gerais, a location largely characterized by the massive extraction and export of mineral and agricultural resources, and imbued with a long colonial history of violent human and species displacements, the conference ‘Provisões’ presented a rich opportunity for World of Matter to engage with audiences about ‘resource ecologies’, both near and afar. Rather than a polished or conclusive document, ‘Provisões’ functions as a workbook, conveying the project’s evolution toward the launch of its comprehensive, multi-media web platform, as well as its first mise-en-scène in the exhibition space at HMKV dortmund, in Germany, both later this year.

In the last sixty years, more natural resources have been raided by humans than in all previous centuries together. large-scale mining is penetrating ever-deeper layers, multinational land grabs are advancing to remote corners, and the race is on for the neocolonial division of the seabed. This frantic rhythm of ‘progress’ has spurred images of crisis and doom while firing up the competitive rush for new frontiers.

With growing consciousness about global environmental lim-its, there is urgent need for new modes of representation that shift resource-related debates from a market driven domain to open platforms for engaged and decentralized public dis-course. First and foremost, the assumption that everything is a potential resource for human consumption must be chal-lenged, as this anthropocentric vision has led directly to count-less environmental and social disasters. The book ‘Provisões’ traces the move from ‘resources’ understood as a system of supply lines for humans toward a deeper attention to the situ-ated materialities of stuff like gold, rice, cotton, and water, as well as the complex, multispecies configurations within which they emerge. It considers a planetary perspective on a world that matters. Focusing on the development of innovative and ethical approaches to renewable and non-renewable resourc-es, World of Matter considers visual source material a crucial tool for education, activism, and public awareness, particularly in light of increasingly privatized commodity chains and the gated power networks that control them.

The Book launch is curated by Maren Richter with coordination by Camilla Boemio

144 145

ProvIsÕesuMA COnFERênCIA vISuAL

Published by World of Matter. Edited by Mabe Bethônico

Portuguese/English, 296 pages, black and white, illustrated.

Contributors: Mabe Bethônico, Ursula Biemann, Elaine Gan, Rogério Haesbaert, Renata Marquez, Uwe H. Martin & Frauke Huber, Peter Mörtenböck & Helge Mooshammer, José Augus-to Pádua, Emily Eliza scott, Paulo Tavares, lonnie van Brum-melen & siebren de Haan, Kaká Werá.

Public talk by Paulo Tavares (World of Matter) on “The Geologi-cal Imperative” was held at the Maldives Pavilion in october 2013.

The video deep Weather by Ursula Biemann (World of Matter) is part of the exhibition at the Maldives Pavilion.

www.worldofmatter.net had been launched at Argos in Brus-sels on october 18, 2013.

Elaine Gan ‘Picturing Rice as Sequence of Events’ Uwe Martin ‘Landrush’

146 147

FIeldInG stAtes: dePth ProjectIon

‘depth Projection’ involves a hypnosis induction where invit-ed guests, during a morning of the preview of the Maldives Pavilion hosted inside the Gervasuti Foundation, are invited to enter into a trance state and perceive the world as having become under-water, not just intellectually - but rather as an ‘incorporated’ state of mind.

The research of lutyens is based on consciousness and social dynamics in that he has worked on large-scale projects that involve interactivity, the environment and new technologies.

The unconscious has often been associated with water and even psychologist Carl Jung noted that ‘water is the common-est symbol for the unconscious,’ so it’s a small step for us to take the watery unconscious mind to meet the impending reality of a world in which water levels are rising, and cities and states that are currently above water will soon find them-selves below.

Malé, the capital of the Maldives, an island nation in the Indi-an ocean, as much as the city of Venice, both see themselves confronting an impending sea-change and rising water lev-els. This is a violent reality in terms of the impending challeng-es that populations in low-lying areas will soon be facing. In the case of the Republic of the Maldives, which is the lowest country in the world, with a maximum natural ground level of

only 2.4 meters, the prospect of the nation being underwater by 2080 is very real and the likelihood of the population be-coming forced to migrate is very high.

‘depth Projection’ is an experiment to condition the uncon-scious mind to habituate itself to breathing underwater, per-haps accelerating the physiological potential of the human body to change with rising sea levels.

Although ‘depth Projection’ is a speculative and theoretical project, perhaps linked to what the philosopher Vinciane de-spret terms the ‘porous self’, a self that is able to change and mutate to differing circumstances, the study of abiotic forces such as climate change on the evolution of species (rather than biotic forces such as the competition between species) is very well developed in recent research. The predominance of abiotic over biotic forces in evolution is called the Court Jester hypothesis, and perhaps it is in this spirit that we are attempt-ing this transformation or migration of the psyche.

As our collective fate is increasingly in the hands of corpo-rate and supranational interests that decline to support much needed reductions in carbon emissions, it is important for us to consider an approach for unilateral adaptation.

148 149

hAnnA hUsBerG, lAUrA McleAn And KAllIoPI tsIPnI-KolAzA ThE COnTIngEnT MOvEMEnTS SyMPOSIuM

‘The Contingent Movements symposium’ will take place at the Maldives Pavilion and at the library of Historical Archives of Contemporary Arts (AsAC) of the Venice Biennale over the 28th and 29th of september 2013.

‘The Contingent Movements symposium’ emerges from ‘The Contingent Movements Archive’, an online archival project that speculates on the contingent circumstances the low-lying is-land nation of the Maldives may face as global temperatures and sea levels rise. It is predicted that the country could be un-inhabitable by the end of the 21st century.

‘The Contingent Movements symposium’ will unpack some problematics and possibilities of this scenario. speculating on the circumstances Maldivians may face as a permanently dis-placed population, and exploring these contingencies within a global context, it will address the potential humanitarian and cultural consequences of this situation. Contributors from a range of disciplines will think through the effects of national and international law on human movements, and consider how mobile technology and the Internet might assist in pre-serving the culture of the Maldives, while helping dispersed communities adapt and connect.

suvendrini Perera (Curtin University) challenges the island as a sign of spatial completeness as she discusses three island states - the Maldives, sri lanka and India - as artifacts of co-lonial history now cast into states of ontological, political and environmental crisis. While Mariyam shiuna (Maldives Research & soAs, University of london), through a focus on processes of democratization in the Maldives, engages with questions relating to the preservation of Maldivian culture, history and sovereignty should the nation cease to exist. Marianne Franklin (Goldsmiths, University of london) will speculate on floating digital archives as a medium for preservation and regeneration of cultural heritage.

Contesting the violence of ‘unintended consequences’ of cli-mate change, nabil Ahmed (Goldsmiths, University of london) asks how shifting territories redefine legal and political defini-tions and boundaries, and whether new laws need to be imag-

ined. davor Vidas (Fridtjof nansen Institute, norway), chair of the committee on International law and sea-level Rise and member of the Anthropocene Working Group of the Interna-tional Commission on stratigraphy, will in turn develop on the challenges of international law in response to sea-level rise in the 21st century. T.J. demos (University College london) will consider how various environmental crises are increasingly bringing about forced displacements, approaching discussions of political ecology, environmental crisis, and artistic and ac-tivist aesthetics in the current global moment. Having investi-gated the relations between location, positionality, subjectivity and arts practices in her work, Irit Rogoff (Goldsmiths, Univer-sity of london) will go further to discuss recent shifts in relation to place and the exhaustion of geography.

Ravi Agarval will join for discussion following a screening of his work, and Rosa Barba’s film outwardly From Earth’s Centre will also be shown.

Also in association with the Maldives Pavilion, artist Klaus schafler and curator Maren Richter will take symposium par-ticipants on a boat trip to the lagoons of Venice, where they will discuss with Venetian urbanist and activist stefano Boato and scientist luca Zaggia the recent effects of the rising sea level in the region.

Curator and writer dorian Batycka and curator and theorist Mike Watson, currently in residence at the Gervasuti Foundation, will introduce the project ‘Joan of Art’: Towards a Free Education and present a course on art, politics and ecology to be delivered in november. For more information visit: www.joanofart.net

‘The Contingent Movements Archive and symposium’ are cu-rated by Hanna Husberg and laura Mclean, and developed with Kalliopi Tsipni-Kolaza for the Maldives Pavilion.

The Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body, has assisted this project. Frame Visual Art Finland, Arts Promotion Centre Fin-land, and svenska Kulturfonden, Finland also support it. It is partnered with Maldives Research.

151

crItIcAl textsAnd theoretIcAl

contextUAlIsAtIon

152 153

CamIlla BOemIO: What about emergencies today?

alFredO CramerOttI: The very idea of ‘emergency’ has en-tered the realm of the normal. one may say that there are many more emergencies than normalities, and this, in turn, has the effect of ‘normalizing’ the emergency. The ‘state of exception’ of the war on terror especially has made this atti-tude a routine. That is why it is so hard to talk about a general plan of action, or a call to synchronized approach to whatever subject, since the widespread perception is that there is no greater danger than another.

CB: The Maldives Pavilion tends to increase the difference and complexity, to propose new temporal dimensions, ‘an exhibi-tion like an archipelago.’ Can you talk about this?

aC: The idea to create an exhibition with a complex set of refer-ences was precisely to convey a sense of urgency. The set-up itself of the exhibition, with crisscrossing references of time, space and narrative, offers not a single, unitary vision of what is the ‘urgency’ (in this case: the politics of climate change) but rather a multilayered approach that encompasses traditional and new artistic practices, mass media, film, symposia, parallel projects, talk and performance. The temporal dimension was further highlighted since the exhibition that opened in May 2013 for the Biennale was one element of the project, but not the full body: over six months of activities, there were master classes, spin-off exhibitions, talks, film screenings, and public forums that added precious substance to this complexity.

CB: The Martinique writer, poet and postcolonial intellectual Edouard Glissant based his thesis on the concept of time be-ing not linear - and on the relationship between cultures. Can this be applied to the idea of an archive of the Maldives?

aC: Conceptually, yes, it can be assimilated to a non-linear ar-chive. In effect, I am quite fond to the idea of ‘starting from

the middle’ rather than the beginning of the end of a process. starting from the middle means exploiting opportunities in various directions, obliquely, transversally, inter-plenary and even cross-temporally. In practice, such an archive of the Maldives translates the subject of climate change, identity or sustainable development into a constellation of factual refer-ences, opinions, imagination and extrapolated data not nec-essary directly related. However, this loose association offers a glimpse on ‘possible’ scenarios for the archipelago. not ulti-mately forming a precise idea of a culture, but rather shaping a periphery-to-centre view of life.

CB: What does it mean today to implement one’s own political commitment?

aC: It depends on the subject matter - dare to say. For a num-ber of topics, like gender issues or political, religious or sex-ual orientation, the ‘fragmented’ approach of the individual, bringing out his or her own body and mind to directly expose and confront a situation, can be crucial. The activist group Fe-men are doing that, and they are succeeding. If we are talk-ing about climate change and the economic sustainability in relation to the environment, then I’m afraid the ‘personal is political’ approach is probably not enough. We can recycle our paper and plastic like madmen, just for the result to end up in enormous wastelands in other countries far from our eyes, where scavengers barely scrap a life by sorting the good bits in appalling working conditions. neither is the top-down agenda of governmental law working particular well, for that matter. There is a lot of pressure from industrial and financial lobbies on lawmakers to curb the level of emissions in reason-able times. However, this has to be pressed again in order to move forward and produce more result on a vast scale, if any difference has to happen. I had a next-door neighbour who was a green activist and the spokesperson for one of the big-gest climate change campaign groups in the UK. He used to tell me that he was recycling ‘for fun’, because he was aware

that ultimately his contribution, and those of the entire city and region in which we were living, was negligible. What was important was to put pressure on lawmakers and develop-ment lobbies and agencies - and invest the time we have not in recycling but in changing the way things are made, and production is regulated. It almost convinced me.

CB: We are all children of a globalized culture, in which the loss of the real essence of today comes at the expense of a widespread activism, or the ineptitude of many clashes with environmental awareness of others. Climate change is one of the major themes that will change the fate of the planet, what do you think about this notion?

aC: I see your point of the ‘diffusion’ of activism to counter a ‘displaced’ persona, in a sense. I do think that climate change can indeed bring together a common awareness, ultimately. But it will be difficult to solve it bottom-up only. That aware-ness needs to be slowly absorbed through the political class, the lawmaking community so to speak, and in turn ‘trans-ferred’ to the economical and financial community, which will effect the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services. It will take quite a time. We all hope it will be soon enough. The normalization of the emergency I was mentioning above is one of the effects of the displace-ment of the self, and the self can be re-gained mainly through a constant, forceful, serious political action and campaign, in which people recognize values but also practical solutions in terms of architecture, urbanism, trade, industrial production, and the service industry.

CB: The petro-era coincides with a period marked by technol-ogy that has already come to an end. In today‘s democracies (see the book of d. Zolo ‘Il Pricipato democratico´), will climate manipulation technologies be a key for the future power of nations, continents or new political geographies?

aC: I’m not an expert in climate manipulation technologies so it is difficult for me to gauge their current and future impact. However, I do think they could play a major role. If these tech-nologies become part of the ‘top-down’ strategies to balance each society’s citizen life and its attempt to avoid future cata-clysms, then these technologies will be at the centre of many systems that govern our lives, from education to health, from law to communication. It will be interesting to see in the next few years how these applications will be generating new be-haviors and approaches.

Conducted in September 2013

An ArchIPelAGo oF neW GeoGrAPhIes A COnvERSATIOn bETWEEn ALFREdO CRAMEROTTI And CAMILLA bOEMIO

154 155

The dilemma of the question ‘could we or should we make it work?’ – which the climatologist stephen H. schneider uses in connection with developments in geoengineering1 – is that we find ourselves in a global situation where there is not an answer to which the collateral damages of technically feasible climate manipulation will have. Well into the 1980s, it was not even possible to determine whether the scientifically measur-able climate change would imply a cooling or a warming of the globe.

Klaus schafler’s project ‘Hacking the Future and Planet’ is situated in the border zones of weather research, situated between empiricism, speculation, utopia, fantasies of om-nipotence, poetry, and the risks and potentials of climate and weather manipulation – and, in a way, the work reflects one of the crucial questions of ecology: who can and must make which decisions and when? Above all, schafler takes up one recurring challenge: to perceive the connection between art and science, art and society, where it has long since entered: in the real world. There within, he advocates something that visionaries like Richard Buckminster Fuller already called for in the 1960s: the dissolution of disciplinary boundaries and with it the ivory towers of specialization. According to the architect, philosopher, and utopian, one of the fundamental problems of ecological development in relation to our planet is that so-ciety wrongly believes that specialization is the key to success. In his manifesto ‘operating Manual for spaceship Earth,’2 Fuller attempts to actuate the cosmic relationships of the Earth in a precise model of events and thought pattern constellations and their transformations. Therein, the Earth is represented as a space capsule on a journey through the universe, depend-

1 stephen H. schneider, “Geo-Engineering: Could We or should We Make It Work?” in Geo-Engineering Climate Change: Environmental Necessity or Pandora’s Box? ed. Brian launder (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), p. 3834-3862.

2 Richard Buckminster Fuller, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth (Carbondale: southern Illinois University Press, 1969).

ent on a thin layer of fertile soil and an envelope of surround-ing atmosphere. Both can be contaminated or destroyed at any moment. But when the development of adaptive tech-nologies, systems theory, and regenerative resources could be brought into connection with a modified self-perception of humans, thus breaking the power of specialization, Fuller believed that a planetary ecosystem would actually work. on the basis of the ‘Great Pirates’ – which he calls the ruling powers who must have some understanding of economy, geography, history, and natural science in equal measure in order to capture booty – he traces the historical develop-ment of specialization and its instrumentability. In order for the pirates to be able to conquer the world with increasing profit, they began working together with a second category of humans: holistic-thinking ‘leonardos’ who researched and invented for them as designers-scientists-artists-inventors. In this still-today successful union between power (Pirates) and knowledge (leonardos) – politics and science – one element, above all, is most effective: research in secret and hence the potential controllability of society through insecurity; some-thing that reinforced the Cold War conspiracy paradigm and to this today still has ground, be it in the deserts of the United states or in the former soviet Union where complete areas of the country disappeared from the map so research stations could go unnoticed.

Hacking the Future and Planet, a component of Klaus schaf-ler’s long-term project entitled ‘2050,’ sets out at the point where it should be acknowledged that the thesis of artist and theoretician Roy Ascott proved to be right: we shouldn’t ask what science can do for art, rather, what art can do for science, in order to potentially destabilize this power constellation at its alleged fracture points – and to transfer it into the realm of the visible. In a situationist manner, schafler creates scenarios that illustrate what would happen if we were to follow the simple formula of politics. In artistic pseudo-laboratory situa-tions, he explores societal realities, futurology, false prognoses

and failed experiments, fictions, science, and responsibility and knowledge mainstreams. Piece by piece, he processes the individual aspects that dissect the historical contingency of a possible end to our world. In the juxtaposition and some-times the combination of dangers, chances, and their protag-onists, he wants to capture more than just reciprocity in an unstable equilibrium. In self-experiments, his work on climate research and weather manipulation explores – perhaps even more elaborately than in previous projects – new connections between art, science, and technology for the development and representation of new cognitive patterns regarding com-munication and interaction in the ecological system.

For this, schafler poses at least three questions at the begin-ning: what is the current state of research and the current state of knowledge and following these ideas, who benefits from it and how, or alternatively, which regimes are needed when we could go ahead with the climate manipulation ex-periment, and what role can art play in this?

It is no coincidence that schafler conducts his research un-der the subversive concept of hacking and its fundamental principle – free access to information. ‘Hacking the Future’ is the title of the book by media theoreticians Arthur and Maril-ouise Kroker about the so-called flesh-eating nineties, ‘[…] when information technology escapes the high-tech labs of silicon Valley and invades the sites of everyday culture.’3 In es-sence, the time when cyberspace had reached mainstream reality. The Krokers’ departure point to the need for action in response to what the nineties brought forth and can be bro-ken down into a simple equation: either you change/process the future or it will change/process you. In this sense, ‘hacking’ means for the Krokers’: to program and process one’s life and there within one’s future as well. Almost twenty years later, the rediscovery of communication has become a part of the mainstream everyday world. It reflects a new economy whose structure paradigmatically also exhibits a substantial charac-teristic of this economy: ‘active life’4 in and on the Internet. Hence, in artistic approaches – as schafler intends them – the idea of whether one can program the net oneself is no longer

3 Arthur Kroker and Marilouise Kroker, Hacking the Future (new York: st. Martin’s Press, 1996), back cover.

4 Paolo Virno, A Grammar of the Multitude (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004).

central, rather if one can constructively unify the potentiality

of the exchange of ideas, in the manner of how the Internet

has brought with it the potentiality of action in real space, one

of ecological change. Quite often, these newly won spaces of

potential deal with the structure of the knowledge economy

and the resistance techniques counteracting it, for example,

of protest or alternative channels of knowledge transfer and

action.

Even though schafler doesn’t propose a separation of myth,

sci-fi, and reality, rather, quite on the contrary – the sampling

of truth constructions in all of their layers, Hacking the Future

and Planet nonetheless advocates an artistic approach that

makes the environment come alive dually as a network and

communication system. In this sense, all protagonists – hu-

mans and the (in)organic world – are in a constant state of in-

teraction and exchange. In the exhibition catalog ‘Ecomedia,’5

Yvonne Volkart suggests that it is no longer about preserv-

ing a ‘pure’ piece of nature as it was in the earlier concepts of

environmentalism; instead, a multilayered and many-voiced

communication system between decision-makers and ‘[…]

the right as a layperson or non-human to interfere.’ The 1984

demonstrations against the destruction of the Hainburg wet-

lands in lower Austria, for example, which emerged from the

WWF action ‘save the Wetlands,’ were – from the vantage

point of the present – a milestone in Austrian civil society ac-

tion in terms of both environmental and democratic policy.

But today, the protection of particular wetlands would no

longer be seen as the main task of an internationally active

environmental organization. Instead, it would be the causal

relationships – for which one must even create a ‘Parliament

of Things’ as Bruno latour claimed – in which both human

and non-human protagonists as well as their representatives

could fight for their interests. For latour, the encounter be-

tween humans and the world of things is already taking place

at climate conferences: interests of states, organizations, land-

scapes, and weather zones are brought together here with

those of concrete persons and addressed on a political level.

However, the problem latour sees is that we have the same

conviction about the integration of human and non-human

5 Yvonne Volkart et al., Ecomedia: Ecological Strategies in Art Today (ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2008).

coUld We or shoUld We MAKe It WorK? Art BetWeen scIence And reseArch

156 157

protagonists as we do about their separation.6 A real inven-tion in a political sense, according to latour, would be to find out which models would enable us to perceive the meaning of the ecological crisis in a self-conception.

Take the hole in the ozone, for instance: is it a real phenom-enon, a communicative one, or produced by scientific experi-ment? The hole in the ozone has its own discursive history. The hole doesn’t exist without it or its research. It is a history of the relationships in the ‘explicitation’ of the living condi-tions on our planet, as Peter sloterdijk would say. Because it is both a discursive phenomenon and an existing problem, this discursivity has thus become a part of the hole in the ozone, without which, conversely, a chain of industrial and political measures would not have been introduced. simulta-neously, individual responsibility is stepped up in importance in this web of relationships. Environmental programs such as the UnEP demonstrate how one can reduce emissions on a daily basis: jogging in the open instead of a treadmill, using a toaster instead of an oven, forgoing the use of an electric toothbrush, and much more. directly transferring the respon-sibility for Co2

emissions to the consumer is, on the one hand, necessary, but also a bit problematic when, in turn, one was to seek a balance between the so-called Global Governance of the Kyoto Protocol Climate Alliance – which will expire in 2012, having produced modest success – and, above all, when ecological self-awareness is characterized by constantly increasing commodification: while it is the ‘Great Pirates’ who remain the ones that profit.

And herein resides the fundamental dilemma of Hacking the Future and Planet, namely: which regimes of climate control are required and who and what is working contrary to a Parlia-ment of Things?

The need for local knowledge and problem-solving techniques plays a central role in the research for Hacking the Future and Planet, be it in the investigation of grassroots activism or re-gional dIY strategies. At the same time, schafler’s work also aims to reflect an inherent art-immanent discussion: can one build upon art historical phenomena, can one learn from con-cepts such as ‘total work of art’ or ‘land art,’ which intended an

6 Bruno latour, “Kann die Menschheit ohne Thunfisch noch dieselbe sein? – Ein Gespräch.” Powision 4, 1 (2009): 69–73.

expansion of the artistic field of activity? Take land art, for ex-ample. Typically, land artists emphasized the ‘borderlessness of nature’ in the first instance instead of acknowledging, as Ulrich Weilacher vehemently criticizes, that natural resources are limited.7 Robert smithson, an early pioneer in the explora-tion of ecological topics, was among the first to deal with the cultivation of land in the 1970s, the so-called ‘reclamation art.’ He sought desolate pieces of land where he would artistically reinterpret the exploitation of natural resources in his work. Environmental art pursued not only aesthetic but also more concrete ecological interests and there within art’s relevance to society and the natural environment more broadly. Artists such as Mierle laderman Ukeles proposed the dissolution of all borders that separated everyday life from the role of art. In her project ‘Flow City’ (1983-1994), the artist constructed a visitor center on a landfill site in new York. This transition from art-immanence to reality-immanence ultimately reflected a disengagement from those realms of specialization that the Great Pirates had assigned to art.

Through the societal conditions that the past decades have engendered, Hacking the Future and Planet is simultaneously a space of action, knowledge, and experiment. But regardless from which perspective this space is observed, it ultimately revolves around the idea of an intersection of nodes of diverse specializations, collaborations between them, and the estab-lishment of an extended space for thought. It contains a mir-ror effect on society and, at the same time, is a plea for critical but also much needed utopian thinking. Even when (for the moment) the question ‘Could we or should we make it work?’ remains unresolved.

maren richter

7 Karel Petrick-Krüger, “naturkunst ohne ökologische sendung,” in Landschaft in einer Kultur der Nachhaltigkeit, vol. 2, eds. Ulrich Eisel and stefan Körner (Kassel: University of Kassel, 2007), 79.

How do we know nature? In a way Nature is absolute, defined

by the science of atoms and molecules, bound by its laws. In an-

other way, it resonates with us in deep ways, shaping our ideas

about the world (and in fact the idea of ‘nature’ itself ). We relate

to it as part of our individual and collective memory and imag-

ine it through the lens of our local cultures, its literature, poetry

and myth.

What constitutes a real perception of nature?

All around the Arctic Ocean, the impact of climate change is

spectacular: icecaps melt, glaciers disappear, mountains and riv-

ers move. Some human settlements must be abandoned, others

relocated. Fish schools migrate thousands of miles, some regions

lose their fishing fleets and their canneries; others can create a

new fishing industry. Oil, gas and minerals buried under frozen

ground are now reachable at lower costs. Harbours are being

built to service the ships that will be sailing the northern route

between Asia and Europe.

When I started to create a part of the program events in conjunc-

tion with the first ever Maldives National Pavilion during the 55th

Venice Biennale, I thought about building collaborations with

artists who have dedicated research and attention to climate

change.

My idea was therefore to create a ‘global map of nature’ that

started from the Maldives…

My investigation led to several dialogues with Ravi Agarwal,

Leon Cmielewski and Josephine Starrs, artists whose work leads

one to question the relationship between nature, ecology and

perception.

CamIlla BOemIO: You are an artist, a writer and an environ-mentalist. Your work includes photography, video, installation and public art and you have also produced a successful photo book called ‘down and out labouring Under Globalization’, can you tell me about it and your background?

ravI agarwal: It all began with my first camera when I was 12 years old. Ever since it has been a constant discovery of a personalised world. I became an engineer, an entrepreneur, an activist along the way, and in many ways my search was driven by the world I could only see through my camera. We seem to have lost our sense of mortality, frailness and interde-pendency. My camera produced an order and a retreat that was only mine. I think curiosity, passion and aesthetics find their own forms. Art brought them all together for me. I tried public art, video, and continue to experiment with new ways and methods. down and out, the book, was an invitation to collaborate on a project I cared a great deal about. It helped me understand both issues of power and representation in photography, but also about the dignity and humility of those people who power India’s economy from the ground up and the poor mi-grant workers. It was about the politics of migration, but also a personal journey in documenting ‘others.’

CB: Can you tell me about your ‘Personal Ecologies’?

ra: Increasingly I saw my work as being reflective of my sub-jectivity. For example, it was less a photograph of something outside: a ‘truth,’ but rather my subjectivity about it. My work became more self-reflexive and in many of the works, such as ‘Extinction? or Ecology of desire’ series, I tried to explore my encounter with these ideas. They are not told as larger narra-tives, but personal stories and questions that could also have meaning for others.

A GloBAl MAP oF nAtUre dIALOguES WITh RAvI AgARWAL, LEOn CMIELEWSkI And JOSEPhInE STARRS

160 161

marginalized, and those who do not inculcate popular views are inscribed with a lack of credibility as speaking beings. But-ler describes this circumstance as:

A foreclosure of critique [that] empties the public domain of debate and democratic contestation itself, so that debate be-comes the exchange of views among the like-minded, and criticism, which ought to be central to any democracy, be-comes a fugitive and suspect activity.10

In this way the public sphere functions as the de facto pro-to-fascist state of the many, whereby any views that do not circumscribe with popular opinion are quickly labeled as treasonous. This amounts to a hegemonic state of affairs that cripples debate, undermines criticism, and ultimately creates a climate of non-dissenting popular opinion that any activist group, organization, or individual, must invariably recognize and contend with on a day to day basis. As Edward Bernays so acutely understood, this becomes key to mounting any type of popular social or cultural movement, in that ‘those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power;’11 con-tributing to the idea that identity politics acts like a catalyst for what is audible and visible within the public domain.

Yet, if climate change is the paradigmatic issue of the new pol-itics today, it is also a reminder that the effervescence many in the left have concerning rising global temperature, sea levels, carbon emissions, etc., are hampered by a collective identity crisis par excellence. Consider for a moment the preoccupation many Western liberals and leftists have with climate change and global warming. Apart from communities on the front line of environmental degradation - such as the Indigenous people in Canada who live downstream from the tar sands or those in the Maldives threatened with a complete apocalyp-tic scenario in relation to rising sea levels - many individuals are blind to the ways in which ecological crises manifest and often lack the very language to describe the complete and utter failure of state and corporate sponsored environmental policies and laws. Many individuals think that by doing their part: recycling, buying organic food, not littering, etc., that the

10 Ibid., p. XX.

11 Edward Bernays (1928) Propaganda. new York: Ig Publishing.

climate crisis will magically dissipate, believing that also on a larger scale it will be sufficiently addressed by large corpo-rations and politicians, the same group of actors who have increasingly utilized the hollow rhetoric of ‘going green’ as a clever marketing ploy, as if taken straight from the pubic rela-tions notebook of Bernays himself. The deceptive reassurance that comes from individuals who promote the ideology of green capitalism comes at a very high cost; it creates a culture of disengagement that rewards minor acts while ignoring the bigger picture. Author and activist naomi Klein describes this phenomenon perfectly using the term ‘dual denialism,’ which according to Klein relates to the increasingly pervasive situ-ation hampering any meaningful or effective action against global warming. Klein states that ‘dual denialism’ concerns green advocacy groups that have become more dangerous than climate change deniers because of their willingness to advocate for market based reforms and lobbying politicians for quick fixes to global warming.12 For Klein, this form of denialism is much more dangerous precisely because it has yielded very poor results, with many left-wing progressives trapped within a backwards narrative of pragmatic realpolitik, by engaging with corporations and states, while ignoring the need to imagine and develop new and different alternatives - from transnational entities to advocates of stronger interna-tional governance.

For many, the term ‘ecology’ itself relates to a balance between organic natural life and a complex set of social, political and cultural relations. Throughout the course of the twenty-first century, theories concerning the importance of ecology have multiplied, with ideas concerning mental ecologies (Bateson), alongside subsequent turns toward social ecologies (Book-chin), cultural ecologies (Guattari), political ecologies (latour) and aesthetic ecologies (Rancière). The cultivation of these multiplicitous value systems in relation to ecology suggests that ecology can be perceived well beyond the disciplinary boundaries of scientific inquiry in the singular, instead point-ing towards new permutations between social, cultural, psy-chological, political and aesthetic conceptions as well. This has created theorizations of ecology subject to a destabilizing set of varying ecosystems that allow for ecological concerns

12 naomi Klein (2013) Green Groups May be More Dangerous Than Climate Deniers. Earth Island Journal.

vITRUvIAn FRAMeThe first ever Maldivian national Pavilion presented during the 55th International Biennale of Art in Venice crystallized around the ideas of art, politics and ecology. Entitled ‘Port-able nation’ the large and sprawling exhibition housed in the Gervasuti Foundation engages with the notion of ‘disappear-ance as a Work in Progress,’ whereby 16 artists were invited to participate in addition to a fairly robust programme of paral-lel projects. As one of the assistant curators of the Maldivian Pavilion, I have been fortunate enough to see this exhibition unfold and develop from the inside. This short essay thereby functions in two principal respects. First, as a documentation of my own personal narrative filtered through several of the works presented, in particular those of Ursula Biemann and Celeste Pimm. second, as a thought experiment coagulating around a nucleus of interrelated ideas concerning aesthetics, identity and ecology. It is important to address right from the outset, however, that this task cannot possibly escape the habitation of my own subjectivity nor the fragments of my education and experience on the loosely connected islands of visual culture and aesthetics. Yet, any conjunction aiming to understand the discursive limitations and points of contact amongst aesthetics, politics and ecology, is anecdotal to a bio-political agenda. Meaning that by prefiguring a set of rela-tions concerning the biological body, the body politic, indus-trial scale economies, law, geographic localities and aesthetic representation, one thereby seeks to pulverize the temporal and spatial scales upon which these ideas are considered differential. Thus, like an archipelago connecting a cluster of islands this essay will endeavour to ask how one can concep-tually map disappearing geographies, by positing this ques-tion more as a subductive process that aims to dematerialize convergent boundaries.

IdenTITy & eCOlOGIeSdissidence and debate often rely upon the exclusion of those who maintain critical views of state policy and civic responsibilities all the while remaining part of a larger pub-lic discussion on the value of politics to affect and alter the algorithm of human organization. To charge someone with being a terrorist, green anarchist, eco-feminist, leftist, socialist, postmodernist, idealist, moral relativist, etc., is an attempt to destroy not the ideas that these floating signifiers represent, but rather instead to undermine the individuals who har-bor them. The stigma that concerns identity politics, as Erv-ing Goffman rightly noted, concerns the ways in which we ritualize performance in the everyday: how one presents him/herself publicly and the stigma relating to the outside percep-tions of our internal character by society as a whole.8 The end-less decry of oppositional rage fostered in part by an endless stream of reality television, sensational journalism, and the more less state of permanent war (and therefore permanent othering), results in what Judith Butler describes as ‘uninhab-itable identification,’9 or the idea that one does not want to lose one’s status as a viable speaking being that one does not say what one really thinks. This claim that stigma often relates to the dogma of human perception correlates to the domain of ecology as well. Indeed, under most social conditions, one typically does not want to disturb the apple cart too much, so to speak, and the invisible line that circumscribes what is speakable, visible, audible and livable, also functions as a discreet instrument of censorship as well. To decide what is palatable to say in the public domain is tantamount to de-ciding what is not acceptable, that which should be avoided. More often than not contentious subjects are avoided for fear of social castration. Criticism is avoided, dissenting views are

8 Erving Goffman (1986) Stigma: Notes on the Management of Personal Iden-tity. new York: Touchstone Press.

9Judith Butler (2006) Preface to Precarious Life. london and new York: Verso. p. XIX.

the crIsIs oF In(AUd)(vIs)IBIlIty: A PersPectIve FroM the dUMPster

164 165

the normalization of these social, political and environmen-tal ecologies that have coalesced into an assemblage of ter-ritories, value systems, and power formations, are becoming more and more destabilized through the choices we make in rendering them visible and audible.

Formatting these choices creates a system of value and a way of sensing and perceiving the world, literally by teasing out the ethico-aesthetic paradigm underlying the formations that together represent a veritable ecosystem of relations. For Jacques Rancière, the notion of aesthetics partly constitutes:

A system of a priori forms determining what presents itself to sense experience. It is a delimitation of spaces and times, of the visible and invisible, of speech and noise, which simulta-neously determines the place and stakes of politics as a form of experience.17

According to Rancière, whose conception of aesthetics redi-rects the experience of representation into a continuum and range of other practices, the question of visibility (and there-fore audibility) determines a general redistribution of the senses. In other words, the notion of visibility that concerns Rancière aims to uncover artistic forms that intervene in ‘ways of doing and making.’ Thus, these modes of doing and making inscribe the social and redistribute forms of production, ac-tion, thought and perception, according to Rancière:

Aesthetics refers to a specific regime for identifying and re-flecting on the arts: a mode of articulation between ways of doing and making, their corresponding forms of visibility, and possible ways of thinking about their relationships (which presupposes a certain idea of thoughts effectivity).18

In ‘Resonant Zenith’, special attention is given to the parceling of the audible in relation to the condition of present ecologi-cal crises facing the city of Venice. Pimm at once addresses these concerns in a matter of ‘doing and making’ thereby re-distributing that which is now audible.

17 Jacques Rancière The Politics of Aesthetics: The Distribution of the Sensible. (G. Rockhill, Trans.) london: Continuum, p. 24.

18 Ibid.

COnClUdInG dIATRIBeThe crisis of in(vis)(aud)ibility in effect also creates a space for potential social and political engagement to take form, but only the rendering of these forms by their opposite consti-tutes an aesthetic intervention into modalities of thought, action, perception and articulation. While today ecology is plagued with an identity crisis par excellence, it is only through an ethico-aesthetic paradigm that this crisis can be averted and new forms of doing and making realized as a form of in-tervention and opposition. Both Biemann and Pimm under-stand this intuitively and their works illuminate a way forward in developing an ethico-aesthetic paradigm that is able ad-dress the multivariate ways in which ecology is conceptual-ized and conceived. Their works exist at the intersection of rendering visible and audible that which had hitherto been invisible and inaudible and, crucially, deploy tactics in which new modes of visibility and audibility become possible. If the ethico-aesthetic paradigm is about enunciating the discur-sive elements and ordering of things, beings, species, ecolo-gies and so on, then the political aesthetics of climate change must adapt to the parlance of identifying this identity crisis and heed to warnings of annihilation and planetary destruc-tion. As the consequences of climate change, ecological crises and global warming continue to manifest, we might be well served to spend time in embracing the multivariate condi-tions upon which this situation is premised by adapting to other modes of persuasion and representation, if only to ren-der this crisis visible and audible, interconnected and interwo-ven, mapping disappearing geographies onto the collective psyche of the present.

dorian Batycka

speculation is a free act. To speculate, to form a theory from a position distanced by time, liberates one from the position of the expert. one can claim some, but not all, knowledge of the factors leading to the possible outcome of a scenario. Where information peters out, logic takes over.

The disappearance of the Maldives beneath the sea is a spec-ulative hypothesis, though a likely and compelling one. The Earth’s average temperature appears set to rise beyond levels considered to have knowable outcomes, and today there is an emphasis on mitigation and adaptation, rather than preven-tion, in national and international law and policy relating to climate change.19

But is dissolution, rather than disappearance, perhaps a more appropriate term to describe the changing state of the Mal-dives? Already the coral islands are being eroded by rising tides, which take beaches and palm trees with them, while salt water permeates the soil. In a material sense, the islands will not disappear, but they will retreat from human use as the archipelago dissolves into the Indian ocean.

The former president of the Maldives, Mohamed nasheed, es-tablished a ‘sovereign wealth fund’ to purchase land abroad in

19 www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/spmsspm-projections-of.html (accessed 26/8/2013)

anticipation of the displacement of his constituents, propos-ing Australia, India, and sri lanka as territories for relocation. The nation faces a constitutional crisis if all land is lost, and no sovereign territory can be established on foreign soil. The maintenance of territory is one of the key constituting ele-ments of statehood, and should land not be maintained, the state of the Maldives could be legally dissolved. Without land, international waters might envelop the sovereign seas, which make up most of the national territory, and Maldivian citizens would have to acquire other nationalities and be absorbed into other states, or be rendered stateless.20

The prospect of statelessness is a real one. Under current in-ternational law there is no such thing as a ‘climate refugee.’ Refugee status, and therefore the protection of human rights by host nations, is not currently afforded to individuals dis-placed by ‘natural’ forces. The acceptance of individuals dis-placed from low-lying islands into other nations as refugees is thus at present problematic.21

speculating on the contingent circumstances Maldivians may face as a permanently displaced population, and exploring these within a global context, ‘The Contingent Movements Archive and symposium’ address the potential humanitar-ian and cultural consequences of this situation. Contribu-tions from researchers and practitioners across disciplines have been brought together at www.contingentmovement-sarchive.com to think through the effects of national and in-ternational law on human movements, and to consider how mobile technology and the Internet might assist in preserving

20 Park, susin ‘Climate Change and the Risk of statelessness: The situa-tion of low-lying Island states’, UnHCR lEGAl And PRoTECTIon PolICY REsEARCH sERIEs, May 2011 www.unhcr.org/4df9cb0c9.html (accessed 18/6/13)

21 Guterres, António, ‘Climate change, natural disasters and human dis-placement: a UnHCR perspective’ lEGAl And PRoTECTIon PolICY RE-sEARCH sERIEs, August 2009 www.unhcr.org/4901e81a4.html (accessed 18/6/13)

contInGent MoveMentsLAuRA MCLEAn

170 171

territory there. This request was rejected, as were consequent appeals for a migration program to relocate the population.40

Many of those currently seeking asylum in Australia come from sri lanka. like India, also proposed for Maldivian settle-ment, sri lanka’s proximity and relatively similar culture would make it an obvious candidate for relocation. significant Mal-divian communities already exist in both countries. Yet mass settlement is problematised by overpopulation and ongoing internal conflicts over territory, which have already lead to large diasporas from both countries.

When such policies and circumstances exist even now, it seems clear that for a future diaspora, near-impossible pro-posals must wrest control from more easily imagined fates.

While Maldivians may not yet be able to claim self-incorpo-rated sovereignty online, and will need to somehow secure livable territory for themselves, perhaps the net might offer some way of creating continuity for the nation that unites them. Before the everyday becomes archeological, before the archipelago is lost to the Indian ocean, could the knowledge, languages, codes, images, objects, and materials that make up Maldivian culture be uploaded, to create a national archive for a diaspora without homeland?

This archive may be scaled up and expanded beyond the scope of a museum, in an effort to produce a proxy nation. But here questions of access become critical. What would be

40 Crouch, Brad, ‘Tiny Tuvalu in save us plea over rising seas’ www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/save-us-islands-climate-plea/story-e6frea6u-1111117655755

the status of this archive-as-nation? Would it be open access, or would borders be placed around it? Would it be a state, a corporation, or an institution? Would these files be artifacts, commodities, or common material? Encryption might secure this data, but it would also entomb it.

To resist corporate or state enclosure of these virtual com-mons, the most logical approach for a post-national archive would be to create a completely open-source collection that is collectively owned and completely decentralized, thus al-lowing material to circulate freely online. In this way, perhaps, Maldivians might regain a dispersed yet common ground, and a resource and site for self-representation and self-enac-tion, regardless of their physical location.

If ‘publicness today has as much to do with sites of production and reproduction as it does with any supposed physical com-mons’, a grounding online is as much, if not more important than one offline. ‘The field of culture’ says seth Price, ‘is a public sphere and a site of struggle, and all its manifestations are ideo-logical… each individual, no matter how passive a component of the capitalist consciousness industry, must be considered a producer (despite the fact that this role is denied them).’41

The Contingent Movements Archive exists as an experimental arena in order to consider these issues, and seeks to explore the ways in which Maldivians, and all of us, can claim agency in producing the future.

‘the Contingent movements archive and Symposium’ are curated by hanna husberg and laura mclean, and developed with Kalliopi tsipni-Kolaza

The first national participation for the Maldives Pavilion marks a turning point in this year’s Venice Biennale for many reasons. A curatorial team selected by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in Male, Chamber of Public secrets, united their knowledge towards the disappearing island, under the nu-ance of a mobile nation, in the process of vanishment from below the water’s surface only to realize the strengths of its ecological importance whilst still lurking above the sea’s fluc-tuating surface.

41 Price, seth dispersion, www.distributedhistory.com/dispersion2008.pdf

We took the Maldives Island as the perfect example to tackle and question the presence of an island on its way to loss, and if you knew this ahead of time, what would you do to bring awareness to the challenges faced by such a case study.Aida Eltorie speaks with Alfredo Cramerotti and Maren Rich-ter about the post-process of witnessing the issues tackled by artists, ecologists and cultural activists in the Maldives Pavilion since it premiered this May 2013.

aIda eltOrIe: The selection of artists brought forward, created an interesting combination of dialogues housed under the roof of the Gervasuti Foundation. A structure, already formally weighted by its consumed appearance – what role did the Foundation play in uniting these projects under the title ‘Port-able nation’?

alFredO CramerOttI: I can answer first-hand so to speak, as I was there (with Maren and Camilla) when we visited the spac-es of the Gervasuti Foundation with the Maldives Pavilion in mind. I had visited the place before, but this was the time in which there was a certain ‘urgency’, both implied in the con-cept and subject of the pavilion, that needed to be material-ized in a physical space. I have to say that the consumed ap-pearance and the layering of history of the Gervasuti Founda-tion, an ancient building formerly hosting a children’s hospital and then a wood workshop, amongst other uses, was just the perfect place. I couldn’t have imagined a dialogue about con-cepts like political ecology, climate justice, human rights, and international law in a grand palazzo on the Canal Grande or in front of san Marco. We needed something with weight, his-tory, and a physical sense of work, a place where one could sense livelihood, struggle and resilience – all features that were present in the Gervasuti Foundation. It helped massively when refining the conceptual approach of the pavilion, as without exceptions, all artists involved were keen to use the spaces just as they were, without superimposing white cubes or black boxes. There was a rare overlapping of curatorial and artistic vision and use of the space.

maren rIChter: When thinking of a container which was able to emphasize the concept of the Portable nation and the cir-cumstances of disappearance and dissolution, it was quite clear that one of these amazing palazzo’s was not accurate to serve the idea, as Alfredo was saying. When we entered this space - a mix of aesthetics of abandonment (and where one can feel history and the meaning of loss or preserved, collec-tive or individual memory, which was a huge topic of many works) plus a particular energy unique to the Gervasuti Foun-dation, which also functions also as a place/culture house for the neighborhood around Via Garibaldi – we got really excited. This building was able to link all the strong conceptual and very diverse points of view on how to respond to ‘Maldives’ as a topical vessel and ‘pavilion’ as a platform rather than a na-tional representation. At the same time the place contains a labyrinth of rooms, which allowed each work some room to breathe and still be in a strong dialogue with one another. This also allowed visitors enough space to include their own expe-rience and knowledge on the topics presented. so the house functions as a mediator with regard to content in many senses.

ae: In continuum to the first question about location, what role did the city of Venice play in the making of Portable na-tion, as another set of islands exposed to similar climate chal-lenges?

aC: Here the similarities are both on the micro-scale, as both the Maldives and Venice are a collection of islands which are facing an uncertain future (or at the very least a long-term struggle in terms of sustainability and development); while on the macro-scale, both Venice and the Maldives can be seen as multi-layered realities of various civilizations and a passageway of cultures in different times. Just think about the respective ancient settlements of Jews and Arabs, and the role that maritime trade have played in shaping the identities of both places – aspects that are mirroring today’s globalization

A conversAtIon BetWeen AIdA eltorIe, AlFredo crAMerottI And MAren rIchter

174

scenarios, which involves identifying a likely ‘victim’ (i.e. the low-level ocean archipelagos), and more about adaptability to the current changing environmental conditions using technology and planning tools already in place (i.e. the urban master planning of the Us east coast / new York area, the sea-proof city architectures of some dutch cities, the very controversial mobile barriers ‘MosE’ currently built in Venice, a concrete attempt of technology implementation however impractical it may be in the future). In short, it is getting the bigger picture but starting in the present from a very localized perspective, rather than trying to get everyone agreeing on what needs to be done on a global scale. This I might add is almost impossible if not coming through a sequence of localized actions. The difficult thing is to convince local governments of implementing existing technologies now, and to convey their expertise in order to build a common sense of purpose. This has to come about from very practical channels.

mr: The Maldives Pavilion is not my first project on climate change and imbalanced geographies. But to think of Maldives as a departure point and tag the inter-relations from here and moreover what it means for a culture to need to think of migration and therefore disappearance - makes the complexity of how we need to deal with ecological change dramatically three-dimensional. The combination of the words ‘contemporary’ ‘environment’ ‘romanticism’ is a big load of issues. It implies (too) many concepts to be precise in my opinion.  ‘disappearance’ on the other hand is a very strong image to showcase how anthropogenic forces and eco-centrism have replaced environmental ethics. I truly hope that the exhibition brought with it a perspective that the Venice Biennial can be a platform for emerging global topics and for making the process of ‘disappearance’ more tangible.

ae: There is always a place to start, both on the micro and macro level. This was also my first experience with an eco-project designed to make a difference by tackling the evident facts of what a lot of artists and activists deal with on a daily basis. What has become most evident in my opinion is the function of something so small - that which crosses cultural boundaries on such a universal scale. This is perhaps most evident when looking at works such as ‘Mental Para-dice’, by Achilleas Kentonis and Maria Papacharalambous, as they have us travel through our thought processes and in so doing transforming them into a garden of history. Just as in sama Alshaibi’s references to the historic travels of Ibn Battuta that later become transformed into her own journeys through the deserts and seas of the Arab region, or in Ursula Biemann’s wonderful documentary that personifies the remote facts of parts of a subcontinent region, and stefano Cagol’s melting Arctic – a silent disappearance, and of course Gregory niemeyer’s sonification of sea waters that change in sound depending on the economical growth or depression of island resources. Each of these works projects such powerful stories captured on a very personal scale. This is just to name a few – what an amazing collection of works, and to document and take them further is no less than an imperative duty.

Chamber of Public Secrets teamConducted in September 2013 Gianpaolo Arena photo

Courtesy Maldives Pavilion