Join us for the release of the book emerging from mirko nikolić’s artistic research, and for an evening dedicated to discussing the documentary power of art and poetry in relation to environmental and climate injustice and struggles for justice.
Day: June 18
Times: 18.00 Panel talk at the library, 20.00 Screening of a documentary film 'Ophir'
Free entry!
The book 'To friends, upstream and downstream, downwind and upwind / Till vänner, uppströms och nedströms, medvind och motvind' traces a time- and place-specific moment in the recent history of a global movement against extractivism, focused in mirko’s listening to and documenting a constellation of environmental struggles in the Balkans. The performance scores/poems in the book weave local and trans-local, personal and collective, into an internationalist story stretching across generations from the past and towards livable futures.
The publication emerges from mirko nikolić’s artistic research project which sought to reveal and challenge old and new forms of extractivism in the (semi-)peripheries of Europe. Extractivism is a discourse stemming from political and academic discussions in the Andes, to capture a mode of accumulation based on large-scale extraction of so-called natural resources from “resource peripheries” to feed the imperial and colonial cores with energy and raw materials. By moving diasporically between the north and south of Europe, and eventually tracing some of the paths of Swedish public pension funds, the book highlights structural inequalities within the continent and across the hemispheres, and the counter-currents working for environmental and climate justice.
After the panel and a break, the evening continues with the screening of 'Ophir' (Alexandre Berman & Olivier Pollet, 2020). The film and the connected multimedia education project about the indigenous uprising against a copper mine in Bougainville have inspired and affected the research and the book. (see separate event for more information about the film)
Participants:
Johnny Chang, working under the studio name Living With Images, developed the concept and design of the book in collaboration with mirko nikolić. Johnny is a Stockholm-based interdisciplinary designer, artist, and researcher working across visual communication, graphic design, publishing, lecture performance, and writing.
Jesper Olsson, professor in literature at Uppsala University, wrote a critical response in the book. His research and writing focus on poetry, art, media archaeology, and media ecologies. His most recent book is Teknoekologi. Litteratur, medier, miljö (forthcoming 2025).
Bartira Fortes is an anthropologist, performance artist, singer-songwriter, and Ph.D. candidate in Environmental Studies at Södertörn University. Her research investigates Indigenous territorialities in Latin America, focusing on how Indigenous peoples in Brazil navigate and confront socioenvironmental injustices through artistic, political, and digital spheres.
mirko nikolić is an artist, researcher and environmental justice organiser. At the moment, mirko works as a researcher at the School of Culture and Education at Södertörns högskola.
The book is one of the results of an artistic research project vatten är (icke-)liv: de-extraktivistisk poetik i halvperiferin led by mirko nikolić at the Department for Culture and Society, Linköping University, 2020-23. The project was funded by a Vetenskapsrådet artistic research grant. One of the variations of the performance was presented as a soundwork at the exhibition at Hägerstensåsens medborgarhuset’s Ljudrummet in December 2023-January 2024.
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