Rooting into the Planthroposcene: Fomenting Plant/People Conspiracies to Grow Livable Worlds Natasha Myers Taste of experience of becoming plant, initiation - little experiment to detune & reattune senses to plant sensitivities - title - tour through field search in urban park in Toronto 1. Kria for cultivating your inner plant / guided meditation Donna Haraway: your body does not end at the skin, your contours are not constrained by physical appearance what you think your body looks like, is fluid and changeable, bodily tissues can imagine wildly imagination is not just in the head simultaneously visual and kinetic, it can be felt image help to excite our senses muscles, tissues can be transformed through words words can activate new kinds of feelings by imagining otherwise and telling new stories, you can access different worlds see without eyes, smell with different kinds of nose, taste with different kinds of tongues can be with others, humans – more than humans – machines to bring otherwise imperceptible phenomena bring into view where order of things disappears, multispecies practise (yoga) approach tree pose: opportunity to experience morphisms to allow it to move in different directions if you want to awaken latent plant in you, you have to follow the plants, cultivate interests in what they care about Travis Bedel, 2014 million of root tips of 1 cell with enormous power to go wherever they want, using chemicals to pass obstacles first dancer, later molecular biologist, now anthropologist long term project to learn about plants Anthropocene 500 years of colonialism buitl on slavery and possession the anthropos-not-seen: those whose lives and lands continue to be spent by anti/colonial powers get the hell out of here, we are not alone! Our most crucial allies are the plants, make lives and worlds livable and breathable for the rest of us they hold sky up and earth down move massive amount of water and air, elemental rearrangers we are only because they are, we are of the plants Plantropos in plantroposcene inseparable human and plant not in distant future after apocopolyps grounded in wisdom of ancient solidarity projects that plants cultivate with their people invitation to root ourselve in way of doing live that will break antropocene logic Timothy Choy (?) ally people in a conspiracy of breathers, to grow a breathable world not only how to collaborate, but to conspire together, breathe together and co-construct world decolonial project that recognises plantropos-not-seen demands protocols/practises to enter vegetalised worlds, to meet them do ecology otherwise: research ‘Becoming sensor (?)’ between art, ecology, antropology: taking ecology off the grid, developing techniques that document thickness of relations taking shape in space nature-culture around us Toronto High Park West of the City, North of shores of Lake Ontario park of leasure and pleasure Large amount of Oak savannas: oak trees, wild flowers, grasses not only dependent on natural forces: needs fire to promote regeneration of oaks depend on people who know how to deal with fire were cared for by indigenous people since thousands of years Active center of trade for millions of yearso attracted deer, bears, tabacco for ceremony Lands were taken in 1787 for meager sum, can be considered as ‘stolen land’ 164 pounds, as a park for the city only 1% of oak savannas have survived removal of indiginous people from their lands, has devastating impact on communities around Canada How this colonial violence impacts well being of land? What does a land loose when it is dispossessed from its people? Taking people out of oak savanna: it will cease to be oak savanna, maples and other trees will come in, density of trees ? late 17th century: deep forest found, it is this image that is taken as ‘ideal’ for forest reservation, but is it really that? Now: control of invasive plants, trying to remove the violence of colonial plants, plants news seeds of oaks of oak savanna when you cordon off a land for leasure and pleasure, it is no longer site for ceremony still no respect for indigenous people they are considered to be bits of live that can be managed consider animism as primitive continues colonial projects we have that break that tendency, just to begin decolonial project forget everything we thought we knew about non-human life reproduction and fitness are not only value for life find new ways to tell stories about bodies and land ? shows new images documenting nature culture that is 10000 years in the making decolonial queer feminist ecologies signs for ‘monitoring lots’ where they have done ecological restauration and monitor sites where you need to be careful what modes of attention do you need in order to pay attention to this land? Together with Ayelen Liberona plants and trees are incredibly sensitive, they remember their histories kinesthetic attunements - listening - tune into bodies of all creatures around us protocols are not intended to recolonise the land refuse colonial norms in order to experience other sensitivenesses how can we expand that discursive space sciences cannot have the only and final say allying ourselves with indigenous activists kinesthetic images render the world otherwise hack into our cameras to disrupt logics keep our moving bodies in the frame participate in the vibration, document the encounter register ephemeral happenings, moment of active participation ‘find freedom with the camera and its presettings’ :-) let their slow mouvements rule our bodies intra-animate with the trees trees as gestural and expressive dancers time-images animate imperceptible and otherwise inimaginable worlds is one form of plant-people conspiracy plants need us to demonstrate, find more people to do so they have ‘abducted’ me QUESTIONS - experience with ayawasca: my connection with plants is too strong to work with ayawasca, I might not come down, I do work with plants as medicine how do we learn to ask permission to work with trees, we have to connect with spiritual ground - what if this is optated to make superhuman: nothing is within our control, nothing is available to contain and constrain, subtelty of this works only requires willingness to open yourself to other worlds, requires a deep modesty, very little room for hubris how do we infect others with that atttude? Still open question - distinction between the sensorial and the grid ‘ungriddable’ is not an opposition, most concerned with colonial sensuous grid, we are trained to see the world through that grid, the quantitative, it is very hard to unlearn five senses have nothing to do with this has to do with all the sensorium, intensely political, shaping what we can see and not see requires big amount of work, disoirentation, trying out and slowly reworking our intuition, perception ungriddable ecology: does not pay a legence to the grid, does not have synoptic view as a military map, ex rolling down hills, … trying to generate data forms that are not reducible - First colonisation: measuring with data decolonize domination of measurement ex measure light intensity of light coming down to forest floor we are playing/dancing with light, in order to document the quality of light – we return to the same place 3 times a day we’re dancing with and being danced by the land - do you have particular companion species amongst the plants that held your hand and allowed you to enter this world comfry, in the garden, sitting and meditating with plants, is first plant that showed me how to have plants grow through your tissues Goethe, Mouvement of plants (?) 3 trees that demand that I work through them, I greet them before I start working - land where trace of colonisation is erased it also erases stories about deported people in this place when white settlers come to land and decide who should live and die, rip out all colonial plants but who are we to decide who can live here, without asking what the plant is doing here ex poison ivy tells me ‘I’m healing the land’ I’m not the one do decide, listen to them indigenous people should take over care of the park, practise ceremonies again and let them decide we need to ask what matters to the land - where are the others (insects, non-humans) plants draw everybody else in! They are center of the world for everybody! You cannot think of it without mycelium, insects, planes that fly by… intimate relations they have with others, always thinking in relation breaks our assumptions about individuality always with others! ------------------------------------------- De parasito a simbiente (De parasite à symbiote) Gilberto Esparza De parasito a simbiente (De parasite à symbiote) Gilberto Esparza artist, overview of 10 years comment la vie interagit avec son entourage, contexte dans lequel humain n’est qu’une partie artiste plasticien, Mexico - impact de la technologie aller visiter les endroits ou on accumule les déchets électroniques rammassé ces matériaux pour construire de nouvelles espèces de vies artificielles ‘parasites urbains’ construits à partir des déchets, déchets retourne en ville pour y habiter ils vivent dans des endroits de déchets en ville de Mexico génèrent imaginaires pour des gens qui passent ex utilise lumière de lanterne pour générer son, électricité du poteau pour bouger espèces commencaient à vivre sur les cables de la ville ex sensor dans la pointe qui permet de comprendre s’il y a un objet qui bouge près de lui, il peut s’échapper, on a du faire la chasse pour l’enlever du cable ex. diablito, petit diable, celui qui prend de l’électricté illégalement il enregistre des sons et rediffuse, bouge quand personne ne regarde - plantes nomades autres types de déchets de la ville problème de l’eau au Mexique seulement 8% de l’eau domestique et industrielle qi est purifié est un reflet s’un système politique corrompue de nouvels espèces qui habitent dans ces lieux hybride entre robot, plantes, bactéries qui pourrait survivre dans contexte contaminé besoin de collaborer avec chercheurs participation d’ingénieurs analse de l’eau des rivières pour comprendre quel type de vie est encore là comprendre ce qui est réellement en train de se passer dans l’eau: rivière pas morte, mais pleine de vie, mais déséquilibrée les bactéries autochtones de la rivière commencent à proliférer, créent un milieu anaerobique dans l’eau, causent collapse dans l’eau et poissons meurent en temps d’une journée ils sont comme système immunitaire de la rivière quantité de la pollution est plus élevé que la rivière n’arrive pas à suivre, en permanente état de défense/nettoyage contamination indrustrielle: produits chimiques tellement fortes que cela empêche bactéries de se développer travail avec biologistes, en SP/Mex, centres de recherche cellule microbiale combustible, deux électrodes à l’intérieur captent électrones générés par bactérie quand elle sont en train de manger déchets recherche de créer des cellules avec matériaux plus communs (parce qu’en général fait avec matériaux très chers) robots avec capteurs d’humidité/ultrasonores/compas quand elle trouve de l’eau, elle prend de l’eau et remplit cellules microbiennes elle va vers lieu sur et dort pendant 15 jours pour faire fabriquer l’énergie par les bactéries l’eau est nettoyé et amené aux plantes qui vivent sur le robot eau plus propre: insectes arrivent, et aussi moustiques = signal qu’il commence à s’intégrer dans l’écosystème ils l’ont libére pendant 1 mois dans la zone de la rivière, interaction avec la communauté ouvre la discussion sur rivière qui a plus de 40 ans de pollution modifier les rapports à la rivière - Plantes autophotosyntetiques un autre espèce similaire à plante nomade, mais statique ressemble plus à arbre toute énergie investie pour maintenir écosystème en équilibre source d’énergie: l’eau contaminé rivière qui passe par la ville avec bcp de matière organique (beuh) il recollecte de l’eau de différents points de la ville, met échantillons dans la ‘plante’ cet écosystème pourrait être modèle d’une ville système transporte l’eau à chacune de ses cellules, eau biogradé par les bactéries, passe par filtres mécaniques, eau propre va vers noyau ou grandit écosystème, là il y a des plantes, crustacés, poissons qui vivent énergie généré par bactéries est utilisé pour générer de la lumière réalisé dans plusieurs endroits: intéressant de regarder les rapports à l'eau de chaque ville analyse de l’eau + combine d’énergie est produite enf onction des chimiques dans l’eau ont créé un centre de monitoring on voit type de voltage que génère chaque zone d’eau + carte de référence avec noms/gps + traduction de l’activité au son ? regardent ce qui arrive à la communauté bactérienne: connectées en séries, énergie passe de l’une à l’autre, cause électrolyse comment la communauté évolue dernière version: instrument portable il veut prendre échantillons des rivières de toute la république mexicaine, pour sonoriser chacune des rivières et ainsi pouvoir parler de cette problématique technologie analogique, intérêt pour la réponse immédiate de ce qu’ils reçoivent des capteurs QUESTIONS - qu'est-ce qui est le vivant, est-ce qu'il y a limite entre vivant/non-vivant? Les limites deviennent toujours plus diffuses - installations dans la ville: autorisé? Invitation dans un musée, on fait une gestion, comme protocole dans les vidéos: illégal