#26 Between buildings: Landscape, Public space, Environment
Sun & Sea
Why the talk is inspiring?
Imagine a beach – you within it, or better: watching from above – the burning sun, sunscreen and bright bathing suits and sweaty palms and legs. Tired limbs sprawled lazily across a mosaic of towels. Imagine the occasional squeal of children, laughter, the sound of an ice cream van in the distance. The musical rhythm of waves on the surf, a soothing sound (on this particular beach, not elsewhere). The crinkling of plastic bags whirling in the air, their silent floating, jellyfish-like, below the waterline. The rumble of a volcano, or of an airplane, or a speedboat. Then a chorus of songs: everyday songs, songs of worry and of boredom, songs of almost nothing. And below them: the slow creaking of an exhausted Earth, a gasp.
The talk with Sun & Sea (Marina) authors Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė, Lina Lapelytė and curator Lucia Pietroiusti will be moderated by curator Povilas Marozas.
2019
Speaker
Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė, Lina Lapelytė, Lucia Pietroiusti
How the speaker is exceptional?
Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė (b. 1983, based in Vilnius) works as filmmaker and theatre director. In her creative practice, Barzdžiukaitė explores the gap between objective and imagined realities, while challenging an anthropocentric way of thinking in a playful way. Her recent full-length film-essay Acid Forest was awarded at the Locarno International Film Festival in 2018 and is touring extensively in film festivals around the world.
Vaiva Grainytė (b. 1984) is a writer, playwright, and poet. Her creative practice usually crosses the confines of deskwork and becomes an integral part of an interdisciplinary polylogue in the form of radio plays, operas, site specific performances, and musicals. Her book of essays Beijing Diaries (2012) was nominated for the Book of the Year award in the adult literature category and included in the top twelve listing of the most creative books for that year. Vaiva’s poetry debut Gorilla’s Archives was published in 2019 and according to critics recognized as a distinguished voice of neo-avant-garde poetry.
Lina Lapelytė (b.1984, based in Vilnius and London) is an artist, musician and composer. Her performance – based practice is rooted in music and flirts with pop culture, gender stereotypes and nostalgia. Lapelytė’s works were presented at KIM? in Riga, Rupert in Vilnius (solo exhibition), gallery 1857 in Oslo, the Modern Art Museum in Malmo, MACBA in Barcelona, DRAF in London. Upcoming shows include Cartier Foundation in Paris, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Kunsthalle Praha.
Lucia Pietroiusti is Curator of General Ecology and Live Programmes at London’s Serpentine Galleries. Pietroiusti has programmed and curated performances and series including Park Nights, Serpentine Cinema and the long durational symposium on interspecies consciousness, The Shape of a Circle in the Mind of a Fish (with Filipa Ramos). As part of the General Ecology project, Pietroiusti is currently researching eco-feminism, new materialisms, mysticism, environmental humanities and complexity theories across disciplines.
RECOMMENDS TO READ
The Second Body
Daisy Hildyard
Why the book is worth reading?
Every living thing has two bodies. To be an animal is to be in possession of a physical body, a body which can eat, drink and sleep; it is also to be embedded in a worldwide network of ecosystems. When every human body has an uncanny global presence, how do we live with ourselves? In this timely and elegant essay, Daisy Hildyard captures the second body by exploring how the human is a part of animal life. She meets Richard, a butcher in Yorkshire, and sees pigs turned into boiled ham; and Gina, an environmental criminologist, who tells her about leopards and silver foxes kept as pets in luxury apartments. She speaks to Luis, a biologist, about the origins of life; and talks to Nadezhda about fungi in an effort to understand how we define animal life. Eventually, her second body comes to visit her first body when the river flooded her home last year. The Second Body is a brilliantly lucid account of the dissolving boundaries between all life on earth.
