Terrestrial University: Swamps and the New Imagination

Critical Zones | Terrestrial University


[13.05.2021]


Swamps are not only sinks for carbon but also vessels for our
imagination. By providing habitats to a plethora of beings, they
facilitate the biodiversity that flourish in the morass. The book
»Swamps and the New imagination. On the Future of Cohabitation in
Art, Architecture and Philosophy« (Sternberg Press, 2021) invokes
the concept of a »swamp« as a tool to address the vital urgency
of human cohabitation with other forms of life, placing the swamp
at the crossroads of disciplines and practices.


The term »swamp« belongs to the family of wetlands that, together
with marshes, bogs, mires, fens, mangroves, and meadows refer to
the gray zones that sit between land and water. In that sense,
the term can be considered a metonym attributed to a variety of
transitional ecosystems and functions. Charged with cultural
political symbolism, swamp is also an irritant term that
delineates an uncanny territory in between the solidity of
determined real and the illiusions of fluctuating otherness.


A »swamp« is more than a biological ecosystem, it is a milieu of
manifold relationships, which fosters discussions about the
possibility of sympoietic co-existence—i.e. the human becoming
shaped collectively with plants, animals, bacteria, fungi and
minerals. Being a very particular modality—»an interface of
Gaia«—offering a »face«, a certain physiognomy to a faceless
networks of relations, swamp can teach us about the ways of
co-existence conceived as co-creation. The contributors to this
book expand on swampy notions, probe experimental art and
architecture, intercalate philosophy and queer theory, and filter
ideas through the lens of posthumanist ecology, informed by the
histories and theories of cybernetics, sociology, and the
commons.


An introduction by editors Nomeda & Gediminas Urbonas with
Kristupas Sabolius will be followed by Joan Jona's reading
performance and visuals from NODE Berlin Oslo. Contributors to
the book Astrida Neimanis, Jennifer Gabrys, Vittoria Di Palma,
María Puig de la Bellacasa and Dimitris Papadopoulos, will unpack
the emergent worlds discussed in their essays. With questions
from Nikola Bojić and the audience.