Paper short abstract:

Lament reworks archaic forms of grief expression via artistic research on post-wildfires ecologies. The transdiciplinary collaboration involves bioart, performance, and community engagement. Often overlooked, burnt soil becomes central in the exploration of more-than-human temporalities.

Paper long abstract:

Currently in development, Lament explores ecologies of death in soil and environmental grief after extreme wildfires via artistic research. It features engagement with communities affected by fires and the creation of a bioart and performance piece that reworks archaic forms of grief expression. Probing more-than-human temporalities, Lament looks at yet-to-come transformations in ash and silence after flames have died out.

The research interrogates fire as postnatural co-evolution of ecosystems and humans – as for instance in species adaptation or traditional agriculture. Yet, fires become noxious on unbalanced ecosystems. Moreover, human-induced environmental disruption has altered fire regimes, with fires developing in unusual seasons and with destructive size.

Considering the co-evolution of ecosystems and humans, Lament teams up with environmentalists to design an open-source toolkit for sensory mapping and community engagement that can, in the future, be adopted in projects on environmental trauma.

The contrast between the dramatic blazes and the silence of charred landscape is expressed in the artwork via the attention to soil, otherwise commonly overlooked. In collaboration with scientists, I will collect burnt soil and ash from wildfires sites and use it for the performance’s set design. The latter will then remain as non/living installation made with scientific and biohacking methods and evolve throughout the duration of the exhibition.

The double register of Lament aims to let go conventional understanding of that which is still called nature, for more-than-human transformations intersect. In such a space, more-than-human death and grief are dignified as anticipatory of hopefully compassionate futures.