Contribution short abstract:

This abstract proposes combined presentation/workshop in which we practice water coloring along with listening, considering how being with water indicates fluid and complexed relationalities. It demands thinking with water which reveals ongoing negotiations between more-than-human bodies and place.

Contribution long abstract:

Being with water indicates fluid and complexed relationalities; being moved with, moved by, in and out of control but always entangled in a flow or, even, a flux. Using watercolors is a way to sense, feel and understand, watery relationalities. It reveals their fluid and flickering natures. It demands one to follow a movement with movement to be often guided to unforeseeable outcomes as it is the water in the coloring that leads the way. Water coloring reveals ongoing negotiations between more-than-human earthly bodies I shall explore using Merleau-Ponty´s concept of the flesh that allows for bodies to entangle in messy but also sensually effective and proximate ways.

This abstract proposes combined presentation/workshop in which participants will practice with water coloring whilst I share with them my experience of being with water when taking a part, as a complete novice, in a water coloring course as a part of a fieldwork. Following Strang (2014) who claims that water is useful for ‘thinking with’ the aim of the presentation/workshop is to consider how we, as bio-cultural beings or ‘organs of this world (Abram 1997), may rethink place relationalities through water materialities, qualities, motions and flows.