the ecocidal eye: beyond the anthropocentric to a relational gaze in cinema

we understand and relate to the world by the cultural works we create

cathy fitzgerald, nz/irelandASLEC-ANZ regarding the earth conference, melbourne, 2012

How have we managed to create such global change?

PART 1: the anthropocentric gaze

The 9 planetary boundaries recently adopted by the UN 2012

‘The Great Acceleration’ (last 50 years) in “Welcome to the Anthropocene’ viral video (2012)

A profound crisis of ‘civilized’ culture

Term ecocide is closely associated with Vietnam war

CULTURAL ROOTS / characteristics of anthropocentric gaze? ‘the hero’, KingGilgamesh’s affect 4500 years ago in ancient Iraq

The idea of the ‘Great Chain of Being’, was and continues to be an incredible powerful and in this example, a visual metaphor of divinely inspired hierarchy, giving man dominion over all he surveyed

Ironically while the enlightenment saw great improvements for humanity, for the natural world it was the dawn of new dark age

Joseph Wright of Derby: Experiment on a bird with a gas pump

...that continues today in our biotech age

Nature 2000: continuing desires: cathy fitzgerald

Nature has almost disappeared from our view, almost like in the movie ‘Soylent Green’ 1972

‘probably no substantial dimension of film history that is so widely admired by a public audience and so frequently utilised in academic contexts has been so thoroughly ignored by film critics, historians and theorists as the nature (wildlife) film’, film theorist, Scott MacDonald 2006

Berger’s highly influential book in early 70s unpacked the politics and power inherent in visual culture that perpetuates & supports dominant ideologies

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in european art Berger drew our attention to the fact that women were often portrayed in paintings as ‘the surveyed’, as property, for male pleasure and prestige, that there is a power relationship in how men survey women, represent them and how men treat (exploit) women.

‘the surveyed, as property; there is a power relationship in how women are surveyed, represented and how men treat (exploit) women’ - the male gaze

It was the ‘manifest destiny’ of the invading Europeans to grow and develop this EMPTY new land

American Progress John Gast, 1878

in recent ecocritical analysis of visual imagery the term ‘ecopornography’ would appear to both be useful and bring attention to the politics of contemporary nature/indigenous representations. ≈

in very recent ecocritical analysis of visual imagery the term ‘ecopornography’ would appear to both be useful and attract attention to the politics of contemporary nature/indigenous representations.

such cultural works have done little to overcome our estrangement from the natural world

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• Scott MacDonald who coined the word ‘ecocinema’ believes

• experimental cinema has potential in

‘retraining perception’....allowing an examination of the conventions of media-

spectatorship (and production) that

largely ignores the earth’

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IDENTIFY RESOLUTION: RELATIONAL

PART 2: towards a relational gaze in cinema and my arts practice

When one starts to look at ‘Nature’ in a creative practice, one feels like one is in a hall of mirrors

Leading ecocritical thinkers are turning back to consider uncivilised worldviews where the word and concept of ‘nature’ didn’t exist Tim Morton’s ‘Dark Ecology’

Jensen reminds us over and over that indigenous people from many parts of the world never, ever see the world as a metaphor, the way it has become in the west.

... artists should move towards ‘an ecological sympathy’

... in ‘lawyer-speak’, Polly Higgins suggests for peace and for the survival of all species that ‘that we must urgently extend our duty of care to all life’

I have been interested in the moments in my films where I stop speaking and allow space for other non-human presences

see 40 yr+ residency in this forest as a continuing dialogue - my relational films becoming an audiovisual diary that I share with other humans online.

ecoartfilm.com ...15 million followers :-)

looking/listening with my camera and mic is certainly making me much more aware of the vast complexity of the dynamics of the living communities & elements - my neighbours that I need to relate to

‘Tending’ Anderson writes suggests a healthy tension, a specific application of wisdom, of culture practices that fosters active relations

A tiny forest in-the-making, in rural ireland, may have something to teach us about

one most important living communities on the planet on which so many of us depend, as well as teaching us a thing or two about the wisdom of

employing more kincentric perspectives in our cultural activities”

read more: issuu.com/cathyartsee more: ecoartfilm.com