"The ones who became the ocean, "
Multimedia Worldbuilding project, 2022
“The ones who became the ocean” is a multimedia project with multiple outcomes, uncovering an alternative reality where humans do not identify separate from the ocean, and ocean is the new posthuman body. It explores an oceanic sense of spirituality and a fluid embodiment beyond the thick boundaries of the skin, through speculative mythology and technology.
The project weaves the wet worlds of posthuman pheneomenology hydro-feminism by the theorist Astrida Neimanis, contemporary policy making procedures and maternal psycology through imagining an alternative society that immigrates to the ocean following a cetaceanic dream. This society is depicted in a far-away-future with extreme ocean level rise, living on the edge of a global flood. By exploring their way of thinking, technology and beliefs the artist Buket YenidoÄŸan critically questions our current ideologies as the main driving force of Anthropocene, climate crises and mass extinction, and intends to change the future through re-creating the past.
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The research and idea development stage of the project has been completed with valuable advisers such as Dr. Francesca Ferrando within the artistic residency programme of Posthuman Art Network, and commisioned by Climanosco Organisation's Dear2050 "Oceans on the Rise" Art and Science Projects Call, in addition to the assistance from the Royal College of Art M.A. programme.
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Collaborations:
Jiajing Zihao, Sound Design
Jessica Mordon, Performer
Ozge Kayaaslan, Performer
Chloe Des Navas, Performer
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Exhibitions:
Alternative Sound Histories, IKLECTIK Art Lab, London, UK
RCA2022, Royal College of Art Graduate Show, London, UK
Omitted References,The Art Pavilion Mile End Park, London , UK
Another World or Not?, Willesden Gallery, London, UK
SPRING, BoatLive Works, London, UK
Posthuman Terrains, The Space Gallery, ONLINE
Dear2050: Oceans on the Rise, Kammgarn Wast SCHAFFHAUSEN, Schaffhausen, Switzerland
Dear2050: Oceans on the Rise, KUNST(ZEUG)HAUS RAPPERSWIL, Rapperswill, Switzerland
ALIGNED Art Films Screening, IKLECTIK Art Lab, London, UK
IED Showreel Moving Image Artists, Gorvy Lecture Theater RCA, London, UK
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Multimedia World-building Approach
Project outcomes vary in media that complete the missing parts of this speculative reality piece by piece lfollowing the archeological methodology as a world-building technique. The short film Ritual of Rejoin depicts the origin mythology; the installation piece Shrine shows the holy spaces of their society with the cues of values and deities; and the interactive art work Ocean-maker let's the audience experience their technology. The artist becomes a whisperer, a priestess of this speculative spiritual practice leading the rituals in performances ranging from participatory to sound art using experimental sonic devices to allow the audience to complete their transformational journey from individual humans to a one collective body of ocean.
