Created in the context of the COVID-19’s pandemic crises, “After Nature Soundscape” (2020) is an audio-visual performance that addresses subjective, social and environmental layers of reality to be reconsidered.
From forests burning in the areas of Pantanal in Brazil, Indigenous, Black and Queer communities fighting against white patriarchal supremacies worldwide, to the digital replacement of the bodily presence, and the Planet Earth as a living metaphor to abolish oppressive systems, “After Nature Soundscape” (2020) presents an immersive trip through internal and external apocalyptical soundscapes in process of regeneration.
But what is dying and what is being born after all? Perhaps, what must die, are all the belief systems based on separations: between humans, Planet Earth and every culture. Between humans themselves. Between us and the unknown. From this, we could start reconsidering the cultivation of empathy, trust and mutual care.
Even though “love was never a very popular movement”, as pointed out by the African-American openly gay author and activist James Baldwin (1924 – 1987), it seems to be the only possible answer. Everyone is responsible, but especially are the oppressors. How do we continue or stop to support oppressive interactions? How can we really support the movement of love? “After Nature Soundscape” is not only a critical response to this challenging context, but also a call for collective action. A call for reconsideration. An invitation to create new desirable timelines, un-re-learning to grow forests of affection: from inside to outside.
“Fui até a floresta, enquanto o fogo queimava.
De todas as árvores que haviam virado cinzas,
restava apenas uma.
Caminhei em sua direção e
abracei o seu corpo em brasa.
Meu corpo virou fogo junto dela.
E depois, reduzido à cinzas,
transmutou a morte em sussurro da vida.
Disse ela:
Vocês, humanes, agora precisarão
cultivar árvores dentro de seus corações.
Abri os olhos e já não estava mais lá.
A floresta também não.
Será que podemos sonhar com um
novo mundo, já que somos responsáveis
pela construção e destruição deste?
Não sem floresta.
Neste mundo, não sem floresta.”
Original version of the lyrics,
written by Luïza Luz. Part 1.
“I went into the forests while the fire burned.
Of all the trees that had turned into ashes,
One was left.
I walked towards them and
hugged their red-hot body.
My body turned into flames too.
And then, reduced into ashes,
They transmuted death into a whisper of life.
They said:
you, human beings, will now need to
cultivate trees within your hearts.
I opened my eyes and was no longer
in the forest, nor was the forest there.
Can we dream with a new world,
since we are responsible
for its construction and destruction?
Not without the forests. In this world,
not without the forests.”
Translated version of the lyrics,
written by Luïza Luz. Part 1.
AUDIO VISUAL PERFORMANCE 28′, VIDEO
About After Nature Collective
After Nature Collective is formed by Luïza Luz and Vi Amoras. We are both transdisciplinary artists from Brazil. At the same time we produce and play live with electronic and digital platforms, we search for organic interactions and also to commune and communicate with people and other living ecosystems. Through the digital, we express the voice of the organic, we talk about social processes of transformation and regeneration. About the importance of the land. The history of oppression and how the machination of the world moved us away from our autonomy. We reclaim this autonomy when we use digital media to express the intelligence of living organisms. To be free and autonomous to think and question the established paradigms and to co-create and perform new ones. Integrating and going beyond fictional oppositions.
Luïza Luz (@luizaluzzz) is a master student at Art in Context Institute, Berlin University of Arts. Find out more at www.luizaluz.com.
AFTER NATURE SOUNDSCAPE, 2020
AUDIO-VISUAL PERFORMANCE 28′, VIDEO
DIRECTED AND PRODUCED BY
LUÏZA LUZ Y VI AMORAS
AFTER NATURE COLLECTIVE