Sympoietic Society

06/10/2024

19/07/2024

A Call to Witness (July 26th, 2023, Mount Gavia)

Due to adverse weather conditions, the collective was unable to hike to the Adamello glacier to conduct field research. Consequently, we opted to climb Mount Gavia, a vantage point offering views of the Adamello and other glaciers. At the summit of Mount Gavia, we placed a text, a call to witness:

“We came here, to the top of Mount Gavia, because we could not reach out to the beautiful ice of the Adamello Glacier and touch it. On the night of July 24, 2023, a severe hailstorm battered all of northern Italy. Ice, which is a source of life when on a glacier, can be a source of destruction during an extreme weather event. For decades, the Adamello Glacier, like many other glaciers, has been slowly dying and disappearing forever. At the same time, climate extremes are increasing in number and intensity. We are aware that witnessing is the first form of resistance, and so we witness. However, we recognise that we cannot be the only witnesses to this profound grief, and we also ask you, who have come to this summit, to witness this change. We ask you to write on this summit book the extent of the Adamello Glacier, which, at the time of this writing, is 16,30 km2.”

Photos: Sympoietic Society

17/07/2024

Wild cooking with Abbi Molinari (July 22-23rd, 2023, Val Camonica)

We engaged in a two-day workshop led by Abbi Molinari, an expert in indigenous plants, focusing on sustainable foraging, culinary applications, and magical wisdom. On the first day, we explored the surrounding hills of Val Camonica, learning about autochthonous botany. The following day, alongside the hosts of Casa del Parco Adamello, we held a cooking session using the wild herbs we had foraged.

Photos: Sympoietic Society

15/07/2024

ICE * Adamello (July 22-30th, 2023)

The second residency of ICE * In Case of Emergency took place in Val Camonica in Italy, home of the largest glacier in the Southern Alps: the Adamello. The area is also Italy’s first UNESCO site for over 180,000 examples of rock engravings, some dating back to the Upper Palaeolithic (between 13,000 and 10,000 years ago, the end of the last Ice Age). Here, in collaboration with Avanzi and Casa del Parco Adamello , we worked with local storytellers, witches, rock art experts, bakers and mountain guides. The restitution programme was based on the slow rhythm of bread making, where we presented site-sensitive installations, publications, and dance performances. At the end of the residency, we invited the community to the second Fire Talk, during which personal memories and ancient folklore were shared and woven together.

Photos: Sympoietic Society

26/03/2024

Stories for the Future (July 9th, 2023, Sideby)

Together with artist Eline Gaudé , we uncovered stories of loss, mourning, and resilience through embroidery. Anecdotes, memories, and emotions evoked by personal or ecological grief were transcribed on a wide cotton cloth, allowing us to come together and find meaning and healing in the shared act of creation. Each stitch became a contribution to the genesis of the “Mourning Veil”, an emotional and tactile archive of collective grief. This veil travelled with the collective to Großes Walsertal, Austria, expanding the repository of stories.

Photos: Stefanel Dobos

26/03/2024

“Sorrow helps us remember something long intuited by indigenous people across the planet: our lives are intricately comingled with one another, with animals, plants, watersheds, and soil. For the last several centuries, we have envisioned a split between our inner lives and the surrounding world. Psyche, however, is not confined to the deep interior of our lives; it overlaps with the wider world and
perhaps, in these times, is most evident in the sorrows and suffering of the earth itself. Our personal experiences of loss and suffering are now bound inextricably with dying coral reefs, melting polar caps, the silencing of languages, the collapse of democracy, and the fading of civilization. The personal and the planetary are inseparable, as is our healing. Loss binds us together in a potent alchemy, confirming the heart’s intimacy with all things.”

Excerpt from Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow, 2015.

24/03/2024

Composting Crises (July 9th, 2023, Sideby)

Dance artist Cilia Herrmann invited us to embody landscapes and ecosystems in the process of their destruction. Participants were paired, with one embodying a natural presence (such as a mountain, lake, river, or forest), while the other assumed the role of a destructive force (such as an oil spill or invasive species). They played out these roles and interacted with each other using only their bodies and physical touch, without verbal communication. This immersive experience served as an attempt to deepen our understanding of the impact of environmental disruptions, confronting these realities through our bodies. What does a forest on fire or an oil spill in the ocean feel like?

Photos: Stefanel Dobos

24/03/2024

Moving with Water & Memories of the Sea (July 8th, 2023, Sideby)

Dance artist Sanna Hirvonen guided a movement class during which we connected with the currents and waves within our bodies. Through a series of improvised movement tasks, we tuned into the connections between our physical selves and our surrounding environment.

In the wake of these movements, Sympoietic Society welcomed participants to share stories, knowledge, and memories of their relationship with the Bothnian Sea and beyond. We forged connections through shared memories and emotions, immersing ourselves in a collective contemplation of the profound ties that bind us to these intricate landscapes.

Photos: Stefanel Dobos

23/03/2024

ICE * Sideby (July 3rd-9th, 2023)

The first chapter of ICE * In Case of Emergency was initiated in the coastal village of Sideby, South Ostrobothnia in Finland, in direct contact with its lingering community. Our research revolved around the area’s connection to the land uplift phenomenon, which has been ongoing since the last Ice Age. Additionally, we delved into the relationship between the community and the Bothnian Sea, explored baking and foraging practices, and uncovered the wisdom interwoven in folk tales and traditions. Collaborating with the local homestead museum Kilens Hembygdsgård .kiili, we coordinated movement exercises, drawing and embroidery workshops, walks, and sauna rituals focusing on interspecies communication, grieving, and speculative imagination. The residency concluded with the first Fire Talk: a series of storytelling exercises collectively enacted around a campfire.

Photos: Stefanel Dobos

31/08/2023

The second chapter of ICE * In Case of Emergency unfolded at Casa del Parco dell’Adamello in Val Camonica in Italy, from July 21st to 30th 2023, where we delved into the rich narratives and ecosystem of the Adamello mountain and glacier, embraced local folklore, explored traditional herbs, reflected on more-than-humans trough bread, and recollected memories of the community through a body of site-specific artworks. Stay tuned for more insights stemming from the project.

Images: Lucrezia Costa, Deborah Maggiolo, and Fabio Tosa