"Ecologies of Tomorrow" dives into envisioning and reimagining sustainable futures. The programme is dedicated to rethinking and nurturing the relationships that shape our ecosystems, including the vital connections between humans and non-human entities.
Cover: Courtesy of Misha Vallejo.
The event spotlights diverse forms of knowledge, from ancestral wisdom to contemporary insights, and examines how art and culture can breathe life into these connections.
The event is free of charge and takes place at Curro Velho in Belém do Pará, Brazil.
To join the various public events, be sure to save your spot via the button below!
Full programme
9:30 – 10:30 Opening and introduction
10:30 – 12:30 Discussion circle “Recreating and re-imagining possible futures in the present tense”
Featuring Rosa Chávez, Gabriela Luz, and Chemi Rosado Seijo & moderated by Yara Costa. This conversation invites us to explore, expand, and connect diverse ways of existing and understanding ecosystems. Together, we can envision future ecologies shaped by shared experiences of humans, non-humans, and all beings, moving beyond capitalist and colonial narratives. It also seeks to highlight non-hegemonic knowledge and its relationship with contemporary technologies, emphasizing how art and culture can bring these connections to life.
12:30 – 13:30 Lunch break
Food from Armazém do Campo, a network of social enterprises that sells food from agrarian reform settlements, family and peasant agriculture, as well as organic and agroecological products. Before lunch, they will present a short ritual, "Mística", performed by activists from the MST: a movement that uses culture and the arts to make political statements.
13:30 – 13:45 Performance “Reaching out to grasp roots I stand uprooted”
Featuring Lapdiang Syem. The performance addresses coal mining and extractivism in Meghalaya, India. It draws from 3 poems written by Esther Syiem, the artist's mother, as reinterpretations of Khasi oral narratives that interrogate the changes that have affected the community and the land.
13:45 – 15:45 Discussion circle “The Right to Land, People and Place; from the Amazon to Palestine”
Featuring Jane Cabral, Tareq Khalaf, Zayaan Khan, and Fredy Papilo Gualinga & moderated by Ixchel Tonāntzin. This session focuses on the realities of displacement and notions of land and territory in Brazil, Palestine, and beyond. It aims to shed light on the methodologies of self-sufficient and civic initiatives that articulate colonial, imperialist, and patriarchal oppressions in (re)building communities and fostering senses of belonging.
15:45 – 16:00 Coffee break
16:00 – 19:00 Simultaneous workshops & film screenings*
16:00 - 19:00 Closed workshop by Monica Naranjo Uribe: "My Center of the World: Where Freshwater and Saltwater Meet"
During this session, local kids between the ages of 6 to 10 will come together to create a collective map of the islands of Belém, focusing on the specific estuary ecosystem and its different life forms, as a way to encourage their sense of care, affection and belonging.
16:00 - 17:00 Presentation by Sofía Acosta: "Lago Agrio, a place where the histories of oil and family intertwine"
Lago Agrio, shaped by Texaco's first oil well in the Ecuadorian Amazon, has profoundly influenced the artist's family history and her view of oil as both alluring and destructive. Through a performative archival activation, Sofía aims to redefine the Amazon as a decaying landscape where utopia and dystopia coexist, reflecting the complex relationship between humanity and nature.
16:00 - 19:00 Workshop by Ixchel Tonāntzin Xōchitlzihuatl and Fredy Papilo Gualinga: "Mapping the Future with the Muscle of Imagination"
The workshop focuses on transforming our imagination by deprogramming colonial and oppressive thought patterns, allowing us to envision and create a future where all life thrives. Through meditation, collaboration, and creative activities, participants will explore new cognitive pathways for radical and peaceful futures, with opportunities to continue this process independently.
16:00 - 17:30 Workshop in the Pause Room: "Collective Oracle"
Through a participatory and simultaneous immersion in publications with diverse origins and formats, we will create collective narratives for the re-imagination of dignified and complexity-embracing futures. Bring your publications!
16:00 - 17:00 Film screening & conversation with Marianne Fahmy, mediated by Benji Boyadgian: "What things may come"
A speculative film that imagines the aftermath of a flood predicted to happen due to the rise of sea levels, consequently submerging the Nile Delta of Egypt. Bouncing between myth and history, reality and fiction, the film deconstructs existing water projects and imagines a future where nationalism can be reinvented.
16:00 - 17:00 Film screening & conversation with Priscila Cobra: "Carimbó Raiz da Vida"
Inspired by the rhythmic tides, "Carimbó Raiz da Vida" is a film that blends Priscila Cobra's lyrical music with Marcos Corrêa's riverside imagery. This hybrid film is a poetic fusion of two Black Northerners' perspectives, offering a unique audiovisual exploration of the Amazon.
17:00 - 19:00 Film screening & conversation with Monica de Miranda, mediated by Joyce Cursino: "As if the World Had No West" and "Path to the Stars"
In both films, part of a four-piece sequence, Monica offers non-Western ways of visualizing landscapes and challenges normative perceptions of memory, history, and territory, while also highlighting the colonial structures and legacies that must still be dismantled today.
17:00 - 19:00 Workshop by Sharon Chin: "Creatures of the Mind, Creatures of the Land "
How did we become separate from the earth, and how do we make the journey back into the web of life? This workshop invites participants to imagine an alternative way of inhabiting the world through collective drawing and storytelling.
17:00 - 19:00 Film screening & conversation with Mohamed Sleiman Labat: "DESERT PHOSfate"
Based on perspectives and philosophies rooted in the Sahrawi way of living, "DESERT PHOSfate" is an experimental documentary that weaves through the story of phosphate, exploring the multi-layered narrations about connections to land, sand particles, plants, human and mineral displacement. The film explores ways of talking about realities, metaphors and poetics in the desert.
17:30 - 18:15 Presentation by Grey Filastine: "Sound Swarm, creating audio interventions in public space"
This presentation will showcase how the artist uses sound in activism, protest, and art. It includes a short history of other of Grey's sound interventions leading up to the "Sound Swarm", from epic fails to greatest hits.
18:15 - 19:00 Workshop by Grey Filastine: "Sound Swarm, creating audio interventions in public space"
This workshop will cover the technology, sound design, and specific strategies that make the "Sound Swarm" loud. Participants will get hands-on with FM transmitters and audio editors. No tech skills required, the tools will be explained assuming no prior knowledge, in the least technical way possible.
*All screenings and workshops will have translations from Portuguese to English, and vice versa.
9:30 - 19:00 Installation by Yara Costa: "Nakhoda and the Mermaid"
"Nakhoda and the Mermaid" is an immersive art installation that highlights the impact of global warming on African coastal communities in the Indian Ocean, who have long lived in harmony with the sea. The installation blends the songs and tales of fishermen with 360° projections, showcasing the wisdom, art, and science of Mozambique's Swahili-influenced fishing community, now symbolically anchored in Belém.
9:30 - 19:00 Pause Room
Space for reading, relaxation and connection between human subjectivities and beyond.
Please note: capacity for the workshops and screenings is limited. If you'd like to participate in any of the events, please RSVP via the link below!
