{"id":7917,"date":"2024-03-12T11:28:11","date_gmt":"2024-03-12T11:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.niio.com\/blog\/?p=7917"},"modified":"2024-03-12T11:35:47","modified_gmt":"2024-03-12T11:35:47","slug":"anthroposcenes-life-in-the-age-of-humans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.niio.com\/blog\/anthroposcenes-life-in-the-age-of-humans\/","title":{"rendered":"Anthroposcenes: life in the Age of Humans"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Pau Waelder<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Centre d\u2019Art Lo Pati<\/strong> in Amposta opens a new season of screenings in the art center\u2019s building fa\u00e7ade. Following an art program curated by Irma Vil\u00e0<\/strong>, I have been invited by the director of Lo Pati, Aida Boix<\/strong>, to curate a new selection of artworks for 2024. Titled Anthroposcenes: narratives about life in the Anthropocene, <\/em>it features the work of Diane Drubay, Claudia Larcher, Kelly Richardson, Theresa Schubert, Yuge Zhou<\/strong>, and Marina Zurkow. <\/strong>In the following text, I introduce the concept behind this curatorial project and the work of the artists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Artwork by Marina Zurkow displayed on the screen at the fa\u00e7ade of Lo Pati.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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The term \u201cAnthropocene\u201d was proposed in 2000 by the ecologist Eugene Stoermer <\/strong>and the Nobel laureate in chemistry Paul Crutzen <\/strong>to indicate the decisive influence of human activity on our planet. It carries the danger of accepting that our actions are irreparable, but at the same time it gives us a sense of responsibility in our relationship with the environment. Understanding the consequences of our consumption habits and our daily activities in an ecosystem pushed to the limit by the abuse of natural resources, the production of waste and pollution is both a necessity and a duty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The notion of the Anthropocene can lead us to think that the effects of human activity on the planet are just a consequence of the evolution of our species.<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Philosopher and biologist Donna Haraway <\/strong>indicates that the danger of talking about the Anthropocene is that it leads us to consider that the effects of human activity on the planet are inevitable, and that this is just a consequence of the evolution of our species. For this reason, she proposes the term \u201cCapitalocene,\u201d pointing out that it is the capitalist exploitation of the Earth’s resources, including human beings, that leads to the destruction of the environment. The philosopher and anthropologist Bruno Latour <\/strong>also indicates that it is practically impossible to study a phenomenon such as the Anthropocene from a purely scientific, distant and objective perspective, because we find ourselves embedded in the very phenomena we are trying to study .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We therefore find that the notion of the Anthropocene is both very obvious but also in a certain way invisible, as it points to something as commonplace as our daily activity. As humans, we need to exploit natural resources to obtain food, warmth, and shelter, but we also extract resources to fulfill the numerous needs created by a consumer society taken to the greatest excesses by the very functioning of a globalized capitalist system. The Anthropocene is often linked to climate change and the danger of mass extinction, but even if we manage to avoid a planetary disaster, our way of life leads us to create an environment in which it will be increasingly difficult to live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this aspect, we must also remember, as the geographer Erle C. Ellis<\/strong> points out, that there are \u201cbetter and worse lower case \u00abanthropocenes\u00bb\u201d <\/sup>depending on how the changes that occur in the environment affect us. In the most industrialized countries, we still do not suffer many effects from the extraction of minerals, the massive use of plastics, the production of waste from the fashion or technology industries, among others, because we divert them to poor countries. That is why it is essential to understand this phenomenon as something in which we participate daily, and to become aware of it we not only need a big poster telling us to recycle more and consume less, but also a narrative, or a series of narratives that make us think about life in the Anthropocene and can lead us to adopt a different mentality, born of conviction and not of guilt or a regulation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We need narratives that make us think about life in the Anthropocene and can lead us to adopt a different mentality, born of conviction and not of guilt or a regulation.<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The facade of Centre d\u2019Art Lo Pati<\/strong> incorporates a screen that brings art to the street and is therefore an ideal space to show these narratives: six audiovisual works created by artists from the international scene that offer us, from different perspectives, narratives about life in the Anthropocene, particularly in those environments and systems that we ignore but that play a determining role in life on Earth. From the ocean floor to the mines from which we extract the materials that facilitate our digital life, from glaciers to atmospheric phenomena, from forest fires to crowded cities, these works invite us to reflect on our planet, the world in which we want to live and what we will leave to the next generations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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