By Amy Brady

Meet Amy Howden-Chapman and Abby Cunnane, two artists who founded and edit The Distance Plan, a journal that includes art, essays, and experimental writing on climate change. The journal is an offshoot of The Distance Plan organization, a collective of artists and writers who produce exhibitions and participate in public forums on climate. In the Q&A below, we discuss what inspired them to launch the journal and what they hope readers will take away from it. I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did.

The Distance Plan journal is published by the Distance Plan organization, which is a collective of artists, writers, and activists. Can you describe your organization’s mission and the type of work you create and promote?

We founded The Distance Plan in 2011 because we felt that discussion about climate change wasn’t happening in humanities contexts that we knew. While there were people working on the issue in various fields, especially in the sciences, we wanted to bring them together with artists, activists, and writers, and to provide a platform that would present these interdisciplinary conversations to a broader audience. Today a lot of people understand that the response to the climate crisis will require a mobilization in the arts; we need to represent the problems of the past and present and imagine a better future, and telling stories that reflect the diversity of our experience is important in these regards. But back then, knowledge about climate change was relatively siloed within a few academic spheres, and the way this knowledge was communicated to the public involved equally remote images and narratives. All those photographs of polar bears and melting arctic ice!

The journal contains gorgeous poetry and prose about climate change. What do you hope readers take away from each issue?

Our most recent issue, “Charismatic Facts: Climate Change, Poetry and Prose,” focuses on the ways language can be used to circulate powerful pieces of information about the climate crisis (one example, borrowed from David Wallace-Wells, is the fact that humans have emitted more carbon in the last thirty years – since the premiere of Seinfeld – than in all prior history). For other issues, we’ve invited artists and scientists to produce images of local climate impacts: things happening within their various communities. The idea is that this may inspire others to attend to the more immediate effects of climate change while also acknowledging the global scale of the problem. The hope is that readers will take away an anecdote, image, or feeling – something that relates to their own sphere of life and work and enables them to imagine possibilities for climate action within their own practices and political endeavors. We want people to get involved. 

The “Lexicon” is a project you are exploring both in print and in your exhibitions. What is the “Lexicon” and how did it come about?

The Distance Plan “Lexicon” is a collaborative glossary of terms (each accompanied by an image) that describe aspects of the climate crisis, providing language through which we can address problems or giving names to under-represented categories of experience. One example is “Gendered Climate Impacts,” a Lexicon term that refers to the way global warming affects women and non-binary folk differently from others, often with disproportionately negative outcomes. Another term is “Real-Time Attribution,” which is a relatively recent phenomenon within climate science wherein extreme weather events are now being linked to anthropogenic warming, even as they are happening.  

Why are narrative and artistic responses to climate change important?

Climate change is a cultural problem as much as it is an economic, scientific, and political one. We need to radically transform our societies and social ideals (at least our contemporary capitalist ones) in order to meet this challenge. Historically, art – and especially storytelling – has played an important role in mobilizing social movements, critiquing wrongdoing, and envisioning positive change. But because the climate crisis is transcultural, the visual arts and other non-verbal forms are increasingly valuable as we seek to activate a global response. It’s wonderful to see Extinction Rebellion using creative modes of performance and a strong graphic-design identity to speak to people around the world.  

Large presses have given us several novels and poetry collections about climate change in the last couple of years. But what kind of freedoms does an independent zine allow you? Do you feel that there are ways in which you can discuss climate change in the journal that you may not be able to elsewhere?

Well, to begin with, we’re not subject to the constraints of a for-profit publishing model. But our independence also means that we can be more nimble and mobile when it comes to what we do and the audiences we engage. The Distance Plan is run between Aotearoa New Zealand (where Abby Cunnane is based) and New York City (where Amy Howden-Chapman now lives). The project has represented the work of contributors from all over the world and we value the ability to turn our attention in each issue to different places and concerns. 

What’s next for you both?

We just participated in the Our Futures Festival, which was associated with the UN’s Climate Week, and also hosted a discussion with Janine Randerson, a climate artist and writer, and Albert Refiti, an architect and researcher who studies Pacific spatial and architectural environment. Stay tuned for updates about more Distance Plan events in New York. And we’re working on the next print issue. Sign up for our newsletter to stay informed about everything and to receive our next call for submissions. 

How can my readers get copies of the journal?

Within the US and Europe the journal is available for purchase directly through our website. If you’re in New York City, you can find the latest issue at Printed Matter. There are a number of bookstores in New Zealand that stock our issue and they are listed at TheDistancePlan.org.

(Top image: The “Lexicon” on view at an art festival on Governor’s Island.)

This article is part of the Climate Art Interviews series. It was originally published in Amy Brady’s “Burning Worlds” newsletter. Subscribe to get Amy’s newsletter delivered straight to your inbox.

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Amy Brady is the Deputy Publisher of Guernica magazine and Senior Editor of the Chicago Review of Books. Her writing about art, culture, and climate has appeared in the Village Voice, the Los Angeles Times, Pacific Standard, the New Republic, and other places. She is also the editor of the monthly newsletter “Burning Worlds,” which explores how artists and writers are thinking about climate change. She holds a PHD in English and is the recipient of a CLIR/Mellon Library of Congress Fellowship. Read more of her work at AmyBradyWrites.com and follow her on Twitter at @ingredient_x.

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Artists and Climate Change is a blog that tracks artistic responses from all disciplines to the problem of climate change. It is both a study about what is being done, and a resource for anyone interested in the subject. Art has the power to reframe the conversation about our environmental crisis so it is inclusive, constructive, and conducive to action. Art can, and should, shape our values and behavior so we are better equipped to face the formidable challenge in front of us.

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Current-day Mumbai was originally an archipelago of seven separate islands in the marsh waters of the Arabian Sea off the western coast of India. As a result of large-scale civil engineering projects in the 18^th and 19^th centuries, the islands were joined into a single land mass appropriated from the sea itself. Now the financial capital of India with a population of approximately 20.19 million residents, Mumbai continues to build on every available piece of land, a policy that has dramatically impacted its natural ecosystem. In addition, unseasonable rains, stronger monsoons and higher tides – the results of climate change – have damaged the area’s crops and caused major flooding in a city with few places for the water to go.

Meera Devidayal

Mumbai painter and video artist, Meera Devidayal, has a lot to say about her city’s relationship with the sea that surrounds it. Born in Delhi and raised in Kolkata, she moved to Mumbai in 1967, where she has lived since. Devidayal’s work over the decades has focused on the city and has included subjects such as the city’s destination as a “dream city” for migrants, and the ghostly presence of its ruined textile mills. It was an experience in 2015, though, that turned her attention to the ocean waters around Mumbai.

On a visit to her husband’s office, which is located in a dense complex of high-rise buildings at Nariman Point, Devidayal suddenly noticed reflections of the sea on the windows facing the building next door. It was a stunning observation because she could not actually see the ocean from where she was standing. In a 2018 article in the publication Firstpost, Devidayal describes her initial reaction to what she was seeing:

It intrigued me because there were these reflections, but the sea was nowhere. Visually, it was surreal and very interesting. I had begun thinking about the idea that the sea had always been there. This area was built on reclaimed land, and the sea had been taken over by it. But it was still visible in the form of these reflections. That set me on the track to explore the sea as a metaphor for nature or the planet, while the concrete buildings are a metaphor for what man’s place on Earth is…You can’t go on and on disturbing the ecological balance. The sea is going to have its revenge…

Water Has Memory

Photographing the reflections on the windows over the course of the next year, Devidayal captured how they varied significantly depending on the time of day, the weather and the motions of the waves. She began to think that “it was almost as if the sea was trying to tell you that ‘I am here even if you can’t see me.’” The notion of the ocean “speaking up” to assert its presence and power over the man-made environment became the focus of Devidayal’s two-year project.

Devidayal used photographs and footage she had taken of the sea reflections to create a video entitled Water Has Memory. The video became the centerpiece of a 2018 exhibition of the same name at the Chemould Prescott Road Gallery in Mumbai.

Water Has Memory begins with a quotation by German painter and sculptor Anselm Kiefer, whose monumental body of work deals with the weight of memory. The quotation, which is particularly appropriate to the theme of Devidayal’s project, reads as follows:

No empty space is really empty. Everywhere it is filled with the traces of the past. The past will always be there in the present. Whatever we put into a place will be mingled with whatever was there before.

The video goes on to reveal a series of images of the worn-out façade of Mr. Devidayal’s high-rise office building and reflections of the sea on its windows. Employees are visible behind the reflections working at desks, talking on phones and conducting meetings without regard for the outside world. In one image, a window washer is cleaning right over one of the reflections as if he is actually erasing the sea.

The patterns of the water reflections are sometimes horizontal and sometimes diagonal; the water shimmers, moves quickly or slowly, consumes all of a window or just a portion of it. We hear sounds of the sea sloshing against the shore, fog horns and the motors of boats. Within some of the reflections, tiny vessels cross the window space, creating a surreal impression of an alternate world. Eventually, our viewpoint moves to a view of the sea itself overrunning a busy city street and then subsuming the built environment.Water Has Memory, 2018

A second video, entitled Mirage, was also part of Devidayal’s 2018 exhibition. Our viewpoint at the beginning of this video is from the sea looking towards Mumbai. At first, the city is just a shadowy image, a silent “mirage.” As the soundtrack kicks in, we begin to see a clear image of a bridge and then the skyline of the city. We move to a construction worker in the process of building a new structure and a series of high-rises, which morph into a skyline of ice. Then a barefoot laborer feeds slabs of ice into an ice-cutting machine until that frame morphs once again into a silent view of the sparkling sea. As Devidayal said in an April 2018 article for the Hindustan Times, “the buildings will ultimately melt away.” Mirage ends with a boat crossing the water with just the shadow of buildings appearing underneath the sea.Mirage, 2018

In addition to the videos, the Water Has Memory exhibition included poetry and a series of drawings grouped under the title The Serene Brutality of the Ocean (see above and below). In these drawings, the ocean is both calm and powerful. The boats, general travelers, and refugees that journey on its surface are under its control and will reach their destinations according to its ultimate will.

In our recent Skype conversation, Devidayal spoke about her ideas for her next project, which will also focus on water. She stressed how precious water is in Mumbai, a city that relies on the monsoon rains that normally occur from June to September to satisfy the needs of its enormous population for the entire year. She spoke about the residents of Mumbai’s slums and the 50-60 tribal villages who don’t have access to running water. Although these villages are located near the main catchment area for the city, their residents must walk long distances to reach unreliable wells for their water. Devidayal plans to use images of the vast network of water storage tanks that are universally visible on the city’s buildings juxtaposed with images of the wells that villagers are forced to use.

In all of her work, Devidayal’s devotion to and affection for her city are apparent.  She tells what she calls “visual stories” that are not meant to be literal or didactic in order to encourage the public to think about and be aroused by what these “stories” represent. Water Has Memory, her tale of the city and the sea, is both a warning about what may soon occur as well as an aesthetically powerful portrayal of Mumbai.

(Top image: The Serene Brutality of the Ocean, graphite, acrylic and blue marker on paper, 11.5″ x 16.5,” 2018)

This article is part of Imagining Water, a series on artists of all genres who are making the topic of water and climate change a focus of their work and on the growing number of exhibitions, performances, projects and publications that are appearing in museums, galleries and public spaces around the world with water as a theme.

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Susan Hoffman Fishman is a painter, public artist and writer. Her work has been exhibited in numerous museums and galleries throughout the US and she has received numerous grants and commissions. Since 2011, all of her paintings, installations and drawings have focused on water and climate change. She co-created a national, interactive public art project, The Wave, which addresses our mutual need for and interdependence on water and has inspired thousands of adults and children of all ages, abilities and backgrounds to protect this vital resource. Her most recent body of work calls attention to the growing number of rampikes along our shores – dead trees that have been exposed to salt water as a result of rising tides.

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Artists and Climate Change is a blog that tracks artistic responses from all disciplines to the problem of climate change. It is both a study about what is being done, and a resource for anyone interested in the subject. Art has the power to reframe the conversation about our environmental crisis so it is inclusive, constructive, and conducive to action. Art can, and should, shape our values and behavior so we are better equipped to face the formidable challenge in front of us.

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By Mary Woodbury

Today we travel to Borneo, to Sabah’s Lost World, a wondrous and isolated basin that surprisingly has not been too explored nor exploited like many other areas in the world that contain such beauty and abundant natural resources, all within a montane ecosystem. Nature explorers are allowed but must get advance permission from the Yayasan Sabah Group, a state-sanctioned organization in Malaysia, which designated the basin as a conservation area in 1981. Imagine rolling mountains and tall Agathis trees, white sands, and a jungle woodland snuggled beneath the place where the mist meets the sky.

Published in June 2018, The Green Gold of Borneo, which author Emin Madi describes as docu-fiction, takes us there. Emin, a Dusun, was born in 1949 in Sinungkalangan, a remote village in Tambunan District, and grew up in Kampung Bayangan, Keningau, Sabah, East Malaysia. He served in the Malaysian Armed Forces for several years before quitting; he took up journalism in the early ’70s. He is still freelancing for the Malaysian National News Agency (BERNAMA). He and his wife, Siti Habsah Abdillah, and their two sons, Mohd Ezrie and Mohd Erwin, live in Kota Kinabalu, the state capital of Sabah. He is currently working on a book about his life in the army.

The docu-novel introduces a strong-willed journalist who fails to heed a Murut shaman’s advice to conquer the unexplored, saucer-like forested mountain summit that sits in the middle of a 390 km remote nature paradise, better known as Maliau Basin (a.k.a. Sabah’s Lost World), in the Eastern Sabah State of Malaysia Borneo. Before embarking on his quest, the journalist encounters unusual happenings and experiences strange events in unlikely situations. He suspects these weird incidents have something to do with his plan to conquer the summit. He’s also suspicious that the Tingkaayoh have kept many secrets from him and dislikes the idea that anyone is about to reveal it to the world.

The book is a fast-paced read, which leaves the reader in suspense page after page. I caught a whiff of Socratic dialogue, somewhat similar to Daniel Quinn’s My Ishmael. In The Green Gold of Borneo, a journalist named Erwin has interest in entering the basin – but he is also engaged by a shaman who has wisdom to share about the importance of spirituality and sacredness of the nature within the basin. One could call this a cautionary tale.

I talked with Emin about his book, which had put me under a spell. Imagine a faraway land, which seems too good to be true, and then imagine it really exists. Here’s our conversation.

Can you tell us about your background and how it led to writing about the Maliau Basin?

The story incorporates historical and real life events, places and names of certain distinguished personalities, foreign and local institutions, environmental players, and environmentalists. The book also detailed the place and historical background of Maliau Basin Conservation Area (MBCA).

As a journalist, I had the opportunity to participate in many resource and wildlife surveys inside the Malaysian eastern state of Sabah’s last remaining virgin rainforests. My first foray into environmental reporting was back in the 1980s, covering a scientific expedition in the now world renown Danum Valley Conservation Area in Lahad Datu, Sabah. The scientific research also involved foreign researchers, including from the Royal Society, UK.

Sabah has three premier conservation areas (totally protected areas): Danum Valley, Maliau Basin, and Imbak Canyon, which were established for the purpose of scientific research, recreation, protection of ecology, environment, and climactic conditions.

In 2013, I spent 10 days with a group of researchers at the 58,000-hectare MBCA, and that was where I got the idea to write an environmentally-based docu-fiction or eco-fiction. I came to realize that natural wonders, and, in this case, the last remaining undisturbed wilderness in Sabah, are very interesting topics for creative writing.

I was even more excited after some expedition participants told me about mysterious events that took place around MBCA. So I used MBCA as a central theme for The Green Gold of Borneo and also based it on my own hands-on experiences working alongside scientists and researchers.

Being a journalist, I would say that environmental reporting was truly an awakening experience, because the survey and research works were meant to monitor potential threats to one of Southeast Asia’s last remaining stronghold of virtually undisturbed rainforest. In fact, the Danum Valley Conservation Area is one of the three leading rainforest research centers in the world, besides La Selva in Costa Rica and Baro Colorado Island in Panama.

My affinity for the forest must have come naturally, as my childhood upbringing is somewhat surrounded by great forests. My small thatched-roof house happened to be on the fringe of a vast virgin forest in the interior district of  Sabah (formerly a British colony), and almost every day I could hear birds singing, the calling of monkeys, and I watched all that crawls, leaps, and dances in its wake. Unfortunately, the forest has since disappeared to make way for agricultural activities. However, I could never forget those wonderful feelings of traversing the peaceful and magical tranquility.

In hindsight, it was a rather misguided passion, because at that tender age I had no way of understanding the meaning of a dipterocarp forest and ecosystem, let alone its great conservation importance.

What an amazing memory! What is “green gold”?

Green gold is a metaphor to describe the mindboggling wealth/value of the undisturbed natural resources (forests) in Sabah’s most important natural heritage areas, i.e., the Maliau Basin, Danum Valley, and Imbak Canyon conservation areas.

From my own observations, despite realistic conservation efforts by the Malaysian Government, particularly the Sabah State Government, the fully protected forest would still be vulnerable, especially if future political leaders or government of the day had little concern or passion for the natural environment, not to mention threats from poachers, gaharu (Aquilaria or eaglewood) hunters, and illegal logging. The biggest threat would be destructive, short-sighted political decisions, such as sacrificing the pristine jungle and wildlife habitat for “economic growth.”

Sabah’s wild is home to some 1,500 Borneo pygmy elephants, which are listed as endangered in the World Conservation Union (IUCN) Red Data Book.

Let’s hope that no such destructive decisions happen in the area. Can you explain the spiritual beings in the book?

The shaman, spiritual beings, and certain characters are fictional and are based on my acquaintance with some local traditional healers, including the Murut people,  who are able to communicate with spiritual beings.

You mentioned that the spiritual beings might feel the effect of global warming. Is the tie-in between spiritually and natural areas real or common in North Borneo?

These are purely imaginary and not in any way related to physical characters. I was simply assuming that the spiritual beings are also very disturbed about the destruction of their world (the forest), and therefore voice out their grave concerns about the ecological impact and contribution to global warming. I used the spiritual beings as advocates of a particular cause or idea. Betarak is probably a myth about a person performing a solitary animistic ritual, usually in a quiet place, far away from human settlements, supposedly to gain supernatural power by submitting himself as “student” to the spiritual beings.

Is it true that nobody has ever really explored Maliau Basin?

Some areas have been visited but not the highest part of the rim. It’s difficult to say where the innermost part of the basin is, because as a basin shape area, the innermost part would probably be located on the valley floor or gorge of the river.

Dubbed as the “Lost World of Borneo,” Maliau Basin is one area where all the conditions for extremely rare human visitation combine. The 2003-2013 MBCA Strategic Management Plan did not specifically mention people having conquered Maliau Basin’s highest part of the rim, but stated that people have been to the basin often enough in the last few centuries for the local Tagal Murut to call it the “Land of the Giant Staircase” from its step-like rivers and abundant cascading waterfalls. Maliau means “bowl” or “basin.” One reason why there is no official record of people reaching Maliau Basin’s highest rim is because it is too rugged. The earliest reported sighting of Maliau Basin was in 1947 when the British pilot of a light aircraft, flying from the west coast of Sabah to Tawau on the east coast, nearly crashed into the steep cliff, rising 1,900 meters above the jungle floor.

It was reported that geological and soil survey teams passed nearby in the 1960s and early 1970s. Only in 1972 did a Forestry Department team reach Lake Linumunsut at the foot of Gunung Lotung. None of these groups tried to enter the basin, and the first attempt of the forest botany group in 1976 failed in the near-vertical terrain of the northern rim. In 1980, a Sabah Museum team attempted the western rim but was hampered by malaria and lack of supplies.

This is all fascinating. Thank you so much, Emin, for bringing to light the delicate nature of this basin in Borneo. And thank you for the gracious time you extended in providing this interview.

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The Green Gold of Borneo provides a fictional story surrounded by factual history and modern concerns about the basin; it’s an interesting novel that takes us to a different world, but the potentiality for crisis is real, something that people everywhere might connect to. Nature Economy and People Connected says that the basin is an area under threat:

Scientific exploration has established Maliau as a global biodiversity hotspot, home to more than 270 bird species, many of which are IUCN Red Listed species. BirdLife International has designated it an Important Bird Area (IBA), marking its importance within global biodiversity conservation.

Besides this, vast stocks of carbon are stored in its trees and soil, which only underlines its environmental importance. Failing to secure this carbon reserve will further fuel climate change.

The article goes into concerns about deforestation and palm oil extraction in Borneo – something that the Maliau Basin has escaped so far. It is great to see that Yayasan Sabah and other organizations are protecting this land. With books such as Emin’s, the forest – in myth, song, and nature – comes even more alive and important for those of us wishing to imagine it from afar.

This article is part of our Wild Authors series. It was originally published on Dragonfly.eco.

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Mary Woodbury, a graduate of Purdue University, runs Dragonfly.eco, a site that explores ecology in literature, including works about climate change. She writes fiction under pen name Clara Hume. Her novel Back to the Garden has been discussed in Dissent Magazine, Ethnobiology for the Future: Linking Cultural and Ecological Diversity (University of Arizona Press), and Uncertainty and the Philosophy of Climate Change(Routledge). Mary lives in the lower mainland of British Columbia and enjoys hiking, writing, and reading.

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Artists and Climate Change is a blog that tracks artistic responses from all disciplines to the problem of climate change. It is both a study about what is being done, and a resource for anyone interested in the subject. Art has the power to reframe the conversation about our environmental crisis so it is inclusive, constructive, and conducive to action. Art can, and should, shape our values and behavior so we are better equipped to face the formidable challenge in front of us.

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By Mary Woodbury

I’ve recently been enjoying Adam Kirsch’s The Global Novel: Writing the World in the 21st Century.

In his book, Kirsch states:

The global novel exists, not as a genre separated from and opposed to other kinds of fiction, but as a perspective that governs the interpretation of experience. In this way, it is faithful to the way the global is actually lived – not through the abolition of place, but as a theme by which place is mediated. Life lived here is experienced in its profound and often unsettling connections with life lived elsewhere, and everywhere. The local gains dignity, and significance, insofar as it can be seen as a part of a worldwide phenomenon.

One of the things eco-fiction is concerned about is the environmental destruction of the planet. Global eco-fiction lifts the gaze above the norm and into a worldly perspective in which authors and artists understand that ecological collapse is both a global concern and a local one. In essence, it’s something everyone is or will be affected by, yet in different ways. I’ve always been intrigued by diversity yet common ground – cultural differences yet universal understandings. I believe in travel through imagination, people world-round working together to mitigate such catastrophes as climate change, extinction, and dwindling biodiversity.

I want to first look at an anthology titled Solarpunk – Histórias Ecológicas e Fantásticas em um Mundo Sustentável, by Gerson Lodi-Riberio, originally published in 2012 by Editora Draco in São Paulo, Brazil. Last year, World Weaver Press began a kickstarter to translate this book to English, and I happily helped back the project, excited to read the book that seems to be the first using the term solarpunk, a concept I have been interested in for a few years now. The new anthology, Solarpunk: Ecological and Fantastical Stories in a Sustainable World, came out on August 7, 2018. I’m thrilled that World Weaver Press took on this important translation project.

Here, I talk with Fábio Fernandes, who translated the book from Portuguese to English. Fábio lives in São Paulo, Brazil. He has published two books so far, an essay on William Gibson’s fiction, A Construção do Imaginário Cyber, and a cyberpunk novel, Os Dias da Peste (both in Portuguese). Also a translator, he is responsible for the translation to Brazilian Portuguese of several science fiction novels, including Neuromancer, Snow Crash, and A Clockwork Orange. His short stories have been published online in Brazil, Portugal, Romania, the UK, New Zealand, and USA, and also in Ann and Jeff VanderMeer’s Steampunk II: Steampunk Reloaded and Southern Fried Weirdness: Reconstruction(2011), The Apex Book of World SF, Vol 2, Stories for Chip. He co-edited, with Djibril al-Ayad, the postcolonialist anthology We See a Different Frontier. He is a graduate of Clarion West, class of 2013, and slush reader for Clarkesworld Magazine.

The anthology features nine authors from Brazil and Portugal, including Carlos Orsi, Telmo Marçal, Romeu Martins, Antonio Luiz M. Costa, Gabriel Cantareira, Daniel I. Dutra, André S. Silva, Roberta Spindler, and Gerson Lodi-Ribeiro.

I bought the original anthology titled Solarpunk – Histórias Ecológicas e Fantásticas em um Mundo Sustentável, published in 2012 by Editora Draco in São Paulo, Brazil, and I was hoping back then for an English translation so that I could read it better than fumbling through it with broken understanding of Portuguese. Lo and behold, Word Weaver Press bought the translation rights from Editora Draco and ran a Kickstarter fundraising campaign in 2017 to translate the book, hiring you as translator. The campaign was very successful. Had you heard of solarpunk before this project, and what was it like working on this project?

I had heard of solarpunk before, yes, but only in passing. I had stories published in Brazilian cyberpunk and steampunk anthologies, but when I heard about Lodi-Ribeiro’s anthology the deadline had already passed, so I never got the chance to send a story – but I read it and loved it. When Sarena invited me to translate it to English, I was thrilled. I loved translating such good stories from awesome Brazilian writers (a few of them personal friends).

I first heard of solarpunk several years ago and eventually interviewed Adam Flynn, who, at least back in 2015, seemed like a spokesperson interested in getting the genre moving. To you, what is solarpunk? I think a lot of people are still wondering about the term as a genre, an aesthetic, possibly a movement.

Solarpunk is more than a literary genre, that’s for sure. It’s rapidly becoming a lifestyle. Approximately a decade ago, a few science fiction writers tried to coin the word Greenpunk, meaning pretty much the same thing, which is: caring for the environment and looking for quick-and-dirty short-term solutions to save the planet. In my opinion, Kim Stanley Robinson is spearheading a solarpunk movement, at least in literary terms.

You have previously worked with Jeff and Ann VanderMeer as well as translated Neuromancer, Snow Crash, and A Clockwork Orange to Portuguese. You’ve also written short stories and novels. Can you tell us some exciting stories about your background with such projects?

I worked with Ann and Jeff VanderMeer on the Steampunk II anthology, in which they published part of a story of mine in a very complex (and awesome) backstory that thrilled me. I became a Clarion West alumnus, having as instructors some of my literary heroes, such as Neil Gaiman, Chip Delany and Ellen Datlow. Since then, I’ve been honing my skills in English and publishing in English-language anthologies, such as Stories for Chip and POC Destroy Science Fiction. I just finished writing my first novel in English, and will submit it to an American publisher.

How many stories are in the anthology – and are they diverse? Can you give a sense of how they differ from each other?

There are eleven stories in the anthology, and they are very different from each other. There’s a noir murder mystery, several dystopias dealing heavily with politics (the “punk” half of the equation is strong in this book), utopian tales of future tech and quite a few alt-hist narratives featuring a modern Aztec and Mayan rule over Latin America, or an ecologically correct afro-Brazilian government. A smorgasbord of stories.

What are your favorite stories in the book – if that’s not too personal – and why?

I’d prefer not to choose a favorite – but I liked the more complex stories, such as Gerson Lodi-Ribeiro’s novella “Cobalt Blue and the Enigma,” “Xibalba Dreams of the West,” and “Once Upon a Time in a World.” Come to think of it, they all are alternate histories, which, I guess, makes my preferences clear.

I recently interviewed author Kathleen Dean Moore (Piano Tide, Counterpoint Press, 2017), who talked about hopeful literature in the times of climate change as “lyric polemical,” and I loved that genre idea. I think solarpunk fits into that. As a translator, what do you think are the roles that fiction can play in times of such environmental crises?

I loved the notion of lyrical polemical – solarpunk definitely fits the bill! I think that fiction can and must play an active role in defending a sustainable society. Kim Stanley Robinson has been doing this very successfully for decades now, since Red Mars. New York 2140 is a lesson on how to transform a city that in other times we’d promptly dismiss as totally uninhabitable. It’s a sort of pocket utopia, as once Robinson himself said. In my academic research, I started to call it a “logistic utopia.” I’m all for logistic utopias in science fiction – I think they’re the next big thing. Thank you so much for the thoughtful questions!

It’s been a pleasure talking with you, and thanks so much for our chat!

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I want to also thank World Weaver Press editor, Sarena Ulibarri, for her help in contacting Fabio and for her work on getting the solarpunk anthology translated. She spoke with the author, Gerson Lodi-Ribeiro, about the original anthology. He stated:

Both as an anthologist and as a reader, I would like to see a lot more optimist and greener future narratives. Even knowing it is not so easy to create dilemma and human drama inside post-scarcity mature and less Manichaean cultures, it would be lovely to read a greater number of those ecotopic science fictional scenarios.

In the Solarpunk anthology, we see that South American and Portuguese authors re-imagine old Mayan and Aztec cultures in new histories as well as explore dystopian and utopian futures. Place notwithstanding, the perspectives are ones we all can understand and enjoy from a storytelling angle.

This article is part of our Wild Authors series. It was originally published on Dragonfly.eco.

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Mary Woodbury, a graduate of Purdue University, runs Dragonfly.eco, a site that explores ecology in literature, including works about climate change. She writes fiction under pen name Clara Hume. Her novel Back to the Garden has been discussed in Dissent Magazine, Ethnobiology for the Future: Linking Cultural and Ecological Diversity (University of Arizona Press), and Uncertainty and the Philosophy of Climate Change(Routledge). Mary lives in the lower mainland of British Columbia and enjoys hiking, writing, and reading.

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Artists and Climate Change is a blog that tracks artistic responses from all disciplines to the problem of climate change. It is both a study about what is being done, and a resource for anyone interested in the subject. Art has the power to reframe the conversation about our environmental crisis so it is inclusive, constructive, and conducive to action. Art can, and should, shape our values and behavior so we are better equipped to face the formidable challenge in front of us.

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By Amy Brady

This month I have for you an interview with Sean Lally, Associate Professor in the School of Architecture at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Matthew Wizinsky, Assistant Professor in the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning at the University of Cincinnati. They’re the curators of an exhibition called The Long Now, on view now through December 1, 2019 at Exhibit Columbus in Columbus, Indiana. The exhibition features augmented reality that helps viewers to imagine what the outdoor exhibition space might look like in 120 years as a result of climate change. In our interview below we discuss what inspired the project and what the curators hope visitors learn from experiencing it.

Let’s start at the beginning. What inspired your exhibition, The Long Now?

Sean: The starting point was to question some of the environmental and technological pressures affecting public space. There is no shortage of headlines about the existence of climate change or the impact of wearable and trackable technologies that may be of use, but I think it’s important for architecture to demonstrate and foreshadow the implications, to engage these complex issues beyond simple problem solving.  With The Long Now, our intention was to create a public space that engaged the pressures of a changing environment and evolving healthcare system, and see what that could mean for our public spaces. In much the same way that fountains changed the temperature of publics spaces and street lighting made public parks safer and available into the evenings, there might be opportunities that exist today to help us rethink the needs of public space and health. To open up this conversation, the project needs to not only exist as a physical space for visitors to engage, but include the use of augmented reality to help them see into the future and past environments of that particular location.

Matt: This project is an attempt to see how interacting with data, information, and physical representations of “other” possible realities can create a deeper connection to site or place. To encourage closer attention to the warmth of the ground we touch, the air we breathe, the foliage that’s there today and may be gone tomorrow. The physical installation marks out a small patch of the Earth and modifies its micro-climate. Augmented reality attempts to demonstrate that, just like every little patch of the planet, this one is comprised of its own very long and specific temporal arc of “environment.” When we walk into these spaces, our human interactions with that environment are a tiny piece of the bigger story.

What do you hope visitors take away from the installation?

Sean: Most importantly, I would like people to come away with a broader appreciation for roles available to architecture when engaging the environment. The dichotomy that our environments and lands can only be preserved or destroyed isn’t productive. Earth exists on a very long timeline and for humans to continue to live here, and in a responsible manner, it might just have to look a bit different than it did yesterday. We can design for a volatile and changing future, but we’re also going to have to question some of our ingrained assumptions about what our future environments should look like.

Matt: My hope is that visitors re-think the time horizons of their everyday lives and everyday actions. That’s a huge ambition, but it’s also something that I think is immediately practicable. The project doesn’t presume to instruct visitors what they should do, but I hope the experience creates a springboard for visitors to do their own imagining of alternate ways of being in the present, past, and future.

This exhibit is a great example of how science, art, and design can merge to create something that’s both artful and impactful. What are your thoughts on the value of interdisciplinarity, especially when it comes to projects focused on climate change?

Sean: I might reframe the question a little and discuss the importance of collaboration. I only make the distinction because when people hear the word collaboration, I think it more quickly brings to mind the importance of working together towards a shared goal: “Collaborating on a song,” “collaborating on a book.” Too often the idea of interdisciplinarity brings to mind the need for collecting difference – the idea that bringing people of different specialties and expertise together even without a clear end-goal can produce something significant. Getting a consensus on goals that align across interdisciplinary collaborations is ironically another difficulty to be tackled. Architecture today not only continues to collaborate with more traditional relationships like building or material science, but is increasingly engaging a growing list of specialists tied to climate change, human physiology, or sociology, who together, increase the complexity of its delivery.

Matt: A couple of years ago, sci-fi author Margaret Atwood wrote a great essay titled, “It’s Not Climate Change – It’s Everything Change.” It was a long and in-depth essay, but the title alone has stuck with me because it really says it all. We’re talking about the complete re-orientation of our relationship to the material world we inhabit. There are really no “disciplinary” divisions to be drawn when it comes to this scale. Instead, I think any effort’s success – whatever the goals are – will hinge on human accessibility. We would do well to get the facts right, but creativity, wit, beauty, and even humor all have roles to play.

Both of you are professors. How does climate change impact your work more generally? 

Sean: As educators we have a responsibility to engage these topics in the classroom. It’s unavoidable. But we must also demonstrate to the students that new creative opportunities exist. Balancing these distinctions is important. If students see the issues intertwined with climate change and evolving healthcare as only technical (or even social) issues just to be “solved,” architecture will fail to deliver what it actually does best – questioning assumptions through the design of new spaces.

Matt: Climate change looms as both one of the biggest threats and opportunities for the creative careers of students today. Teaching Communication Design students, I’m challenged to engage them in the impossible-to-comprehend scale and complexity of the issue. But since it’s everywhere, it’s also right here – wherever you are. Local action is possible, but communication design can only ever be one part of an effective intervention. With so much information available on what’s happening, what’s at stake, and both big and small opportunities for adaptation, intervention, or mitigation, how is it possible that so little change is actually happening? It seems like a failure of imagination and maybe a failure of determination. Seen cynically, that’s a bit depressing. Seen optimistically, there’s much to be done, and most of the young people I work with are aware of the risks and are highly motivated!

The Long Now. Photo by Hadley Fruits.

Both of you currently live in the American Midwest, which isn’t discussed as much in the media as, say, the coasts when it comes to climate change. What is media coverage of climate like where you live?

Sean: As we know, the Midwest is quite large and issues across this large area range. When you live somewhere like Los Angeles, which is dealing with increased wildfires, or the Gulf and east coast that have increased hurricanes and flooding, it’s difficult to forget the continued urgency. However, if you’re fortunate to live in a city like Chicago that hasn’t experienced an increase in frequency of something so destructive, I actually think it’s possible for the issues to remain less scrutinized. Reminding people that the issue is intertwined across our lives is critical. I think the mass refugee migration we’ve seen in the Middle East reminds us all that local water shortages and environmental degradation have both regional and global implications.

Matt: In a landlocked and, generally, hurricane-free city like Cincinnati, climate change can still sometimes seem like it’s happening somewhere else. Then again, we’re sitting in the agricultural heartland of the country, and we just had one of the hottest summers on record. We’re lucky to have many of the resources and buffers we take for granted in the Midwest, but this doesn’t protect the region from damaging effects of change nor, as Sean mentioned, the potential influx of refugees. Last month, I met a young woman from the University of South Carolina, who was in town to evacuate Hurricane Dorian. It’s already happening. Some of my students recently interviewed the Sustainability Officer for the City of Cincinnati, and he’s prepared to promote Cincinnati as a welcoming haven for domestic climate refugees. However, I think he’s one of very few people who is really even thinking about the future like that, let alone doing anything to prepare.

The Long Now. Photo by Hadley Fruits.

What’s next for the both of you?

Sean: There’s always the next project just on the horizon that’s the most exciting, so keep an eye out for that in mid-2020. I also have a podcast called Night White Skies that discusses many of these topics as they pertain to architecture by bringing on a diverse range of guests from other disciplines including scientists, authors, social anthropologists, and science-fiction writers. This is an ongoing project.

Matt: For the past few years, I’ve been teaching and doing research projects at the intersection of participatory design and speculative design. In plain terms, this means I’m interested and invested in how designers can engage public communities in methodical processes of studying, imagining, and articulating alternative visions of the future. The goal is to create material, tangible visions of the future that they find preferable to the “future visions” on offer by tech companies, governments, or other interests. Over the past two years, I collaborated with researchers at the University of Chicago and University of Illinois at Chicago, to engage over 20 teenagers from Chicago’s South Side on this kind of project. The results were fascinating, and we were able to exhibit the outcomes at various local venues to encourage ongoing discourse on a changing climate and local health implications. To continue this work, I recently co-founded a network of similarly interested creative professionals and researchers called the DEEP Futures working group. Hopefully, you’ll see more of our projects in the coming years.

This article is part of the Climate Art Interviews series. It was originally published in Amy Brady’s “Burning Worlds” newsletter. Subscribe to get Amy’s newsletter delivered straight to your inbox.

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Amy Brady is the Deputy Publisher of Guernica magazine and Senior Editor of the Chicago Review of Books. Her writing about art, culture, and climate has appeared in the Village Voice, the Los Angeles Times, Pacific Standard, the New Republic, and other places. She is also the editor of the monthly newsletter “Burning Worlds,” which explores how artists and writers are thinking about climate change. She holds a PHD in English and is the recipient of a CLIR/Mellon Library of Congress Fellowship. Read more of her work at AmyBradyWrites.com and follow her on Twitter at @ingredient_x.

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Artists and Climate Change is a blog that tracks artistic responses from all disciplines to the problem of climate change. It is both a study about what is being done, and a resource for anyone interested in the subject. Art has the power to reframe the conversation about our environmental crisis so it is inclusive, constructive, and conducive to action. Art can, and should, shape our values and behavior so we are better equipped to face the formidable challenge in front of us.

Go to the Artists and Climate Change Blog

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