Beyond the Anthropocene (Parallel State)

The Parallel State is a breakaway state – a space to collectively imagine alternative solutions to life on earth – free from the oppositional constraints of the failed states in which we live. The Parallel State is building new alliances through a series of events, laying the foundations for a Parallel State Summit.

At this online event the Parallel State will be asking:

What does the landscape look like in the Parallel State and what new epoch has emerged in a more equitable, de-colonised, post-capitalist world where humans are harmoniously entangled with nature?

Co-curated by Eelyn Lee and Helen Kilby Nelson. Become a citizen of #ParallelState here. Twitter: @AParallelState

Contributors include:

Youngsook Choi

Youngsook will talk about her ongoing project, Not This Future that commemorates and critically revisits the Essex 39 incident. In 2019 thirty-nine Vietnamese people were found dead in the back of a lorry abandoned by a people smuggler—most of the victims were from fishing villages destroyed by toxic wastes dumped into the ocean. Youngsook is further exploring ecological grief as a site of decolonising practice and epistemic obedience, inviting the voices of other-than-humans.

Youngsook is a London-based artist and researcher with a PhD in human geography. Her practice relates to the subjective position as a woman, mother, and migrant of Korean heritage, coming from a working-class background. Including Not This future, Youngsook’s recent performances explore the concept of ‘political spirituality’ and intimate aesthetics of community actions by composing speculative narratives with research evidence, folk tales, mythologies and performative instructions for audience participation. Youngsook is currently the recipient of Arts Council England Project Grant for her collective healing project Becoming Forest and artist resident for Radio Arts Catalyst 20/21.

youngsookchoi.com / Instagram: young.sook.choi

Rachel Bower

What would happen if we open ourselves to really listening to honeybees? If we listened with all of our senses – and with open-hearts – and let the bees guide us into the Parallel State?

In a specially commissioned poem entitled Listen to the Bees and Let Them Guide You, Sheffield-based poet Rachel Bower will seek to respond to this challenge: to listen in a wholehearted, imaginative way and to respond in kind. The poem hopes to rekindle ancient connections between honeybees and humans; to learn about new ways of living together; and to explore how human and insect lives (and living) might become entangled in a more thorough-going, respectful and imaginative way.

Rachel Bower is an award-winning writer, beekeeper and workshop facilitator based in Sheffield. Her most recent book, These Mothers of Gods, was recently published with Fly on the Wall Press. Rachel is the author of two poetry collections and a book on literary letters. Her poems and stories have been widely published in magazines, including The London Magazine, The White Review, Magma, Stand and Frontier. Rachel won The London Magazine Short Story Prize 2019/20 and the W&A Short Story Competition 2020. She edited the Verse Matters anthology with Helen Mort, and is currently editing an anthology with Simon Armitage.

https://rachelbower.net / Instagram: rachel_e_bower / Twitter: @rachelebower

Angela YT Chan

Angela will explore how our power relations with the water cycle shape our perceptions, stories and material resources.

Angela YT Chan is an independent researcher, curator and artist. Her work reconfigures power in relation to the inequity of climate change, through self-archiving, rethinking geographies and speculative fiction. Her current research-art commissions span climate framings, water scarcity and conflict, and has held residencies with Arts Catalyst, FACT/Jerwood Arts’ Digital Fellowship and Sonic Acts’ environmental research residency. Angela produces curatorial projects and workshops as Worm: art + ecology, collaborating with artists, activists and youth groups. She holds an MA in Climate Change (KCL) and is a research consultant in international climate and cultural policy. Angela co-founded the London Chinese Science Fiction Group and co-directs the London Science Fiction Research Community.

angelaytchan.com / Instagram: a.y.t.c / Twitter: @angelaytchan

Jason Singh

Sound artist, beatboxer and composer Jason Singh will discuss his recent residency at Kew Gardens where he explored the idea of ‘plants as composer’. Environmental factors such as light, sound and temperature all provide naturally occurring ‘biodata’ generated from plants. Jason sampled this biodata through live feeds, capturing the ‘voices’ of plants to create a beautifully melancholic soundtrack.

Jason will also present a live performance of some sonic responses to the Parallel State provocation, thus beginning to shape an audio soundscape for a new epoch.

Jason Singh is a sound artist, nature beatboxer, producer, DJ, facilitator and performer. His work is inspired by the natural world and includes: live performance, sound installations, live film accompaniment, radio shows, sound design, recorded music and the sonic exploration of plant biodata, ceramics, textiles and museum objects. Referred to as “the human sampler” by Cerys Matthews (Radio 6), Singh also vocally recreates birdsong and natural environments. His work has been called “beautiful, strange, calming music” by nature writer Robert Macfarlane and Jason has also featured on the 2019 BBC Lost Words prom, BBC Radio 4 Pick of the Year, Springwatch and Countryfile.

jasonsinghthing.com / Instagram: jasonsinghthing / Twitter: @jasonsinghthing

Jo Capper

Jo will explore what a community and nature entangled arts organisation could look like. By embracing nature and living the questions of our souls, how can we build a strategy for cultural transformation? By entering into the embodied experience how we can understand our inter-being and interconnections with the world? How can we promote reciprocity and generosity as pathways to deeper and mutual respect between people and nature?

Jo Capper is an artist and curator with a strong desire to heal, restore and do good in the world. She creates alternative cultural and living practices that start with simple acts of growing or sharing food – embodying the cultural specifics of human conviviality. Through building communal practices she is interested in the phenomenology of the making process and imagining new educational structures for living. Since 2018 she has worked with Grand Union as their Collaborative Programme Curator and initiated their Collaborative Programme, The Growing Project.

www.jocapper.com / Instagram: jocapper / Twitter: @jocapper1 

 

Anna Hints

Anna will be sharing a clip from her award winning film, For Tomorrow Paradise Arrives–a film about a group of mothers who feed their families with food salvaged from garbage bins. The film has initiated a public discussion on food waste in Estonia and has created a movement to consume food that otherwise would end up in landfills. Anna will talk about her own experiences of ‘dumpster diving’ and how a film can help bring about meaningful change.

Anna Hints is an Estonian film director with a background in contemporary art and experimental music. With a practice deeply rooted in the distinct culture of South Estonia, she has studied literature, folklore and has a degree in Photography and Film Directing. Her debut short fiction Ice (2017), received the “Best Short Film” award at the Estonian Film and TV Awards, has been screened at more than 95 film festivals and has won 14 awards worldwide. Anna’s feature length debut, Smoke Sauna Sisterhood is a documentary about the South-Estonian culture of women washing off their shame in a smoke sauna. The film is currently in post production and is the recipient of the prestigious “Sundance Institute Post Production Grant”. Anna is also a singer in Eeter, a female electronic-folk trio that scored the feature documentary Wind Sculpted Land and was nominated in the “Best Film Music ” category at the 2018 Estonian Film and TV Awards.

Instagram: annahints

 

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