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Micro-Landscapes of the Anthropocene

Dis-emplacement: Spacetime in the anthropocene

Reflection: Dis-emplacement

In this project, I aimed to uncover a profound feeling I have had since the start of the COVID pandemic in March 2020. It is feeling of being alone in an empty space, of feeling safe in social distance. In my mind, I called this term as an “expanse” – as it reminded me of the feeling of safety of being in an open field, as if this feeling had been collapsed into a two-metre space apart from everyone. To find meaning to feelings like this, one can always look on the natural world, which since the violence of the Anthropocene, has experience the collapsing of space. Looking at examples in the natural world, such as the Athabasca Oil Sands, and the Polar Bear Hotel in China, I discovered that the expanses that these animals would have once felt safe, in their place in the natural world, had two been collapsed, either through the destruction of their environment, or when they have been forcibly displaced from it. I thought of this idea in terms of another word – emplacement, the forcible attachment of something to a fixed structure. Combing the two words, I created the e-concept “dis-emplacement” to encapsulate that feeling where your expanse (the world you live in) has been forcibly collapsed onto a smaller space, and an alien space at that. As I continued on with the project, I realised that I could not only learn from the natural world to understand it, but also see a different kind of dis-emplacement that is still true to the original concept: the collapsing of the spacetime of the natural world. This occurs every day, but much like the concept of plant-blindness, where flora is unnoticed or incomprehensible to the human eye, in the Anthropocene, humans have become “depth-blind”, where the distortion of spacetime has changed not only the way we perceive the natural world but is also intra-actively shaping the natural world simultaneously. Enlightened by the application of Jean Baudrillard’s Simulations, I took this new understanding of dis-emplacement to Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, where I found a new meaning to the text – they are not only moving the text, but Kerouac, is moving the land around him as he travels, re-shaping the natural world. Therefore, dis-emplacement has transformed to have a two-fold meaning, and intra-active meaning: it is not only the dis-emplacement of live from its place in the natural world, but also the dis-emplacement of the natural world around anthropogenic life.

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Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.
Contents of this path:
Contents of this path:
2. Athabasca Oil Sand (Matthew Gurney) Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.

Contents of this path:

Reading the close reading in ‘Marginal Worlds’ made me think about anthropogenic environments that do not fit in the binary of nature and culture, places “caught in a sort of a halfway point between the two”. Worlds like this also exist beyond the marginal: they exist out of the limelight, where human existence, and our imaginations, do not dwell. It is as if they exist in a dark, other world, beyond anthropocentric focuses of the natureculture. The image is a flock of Canada Geese flying over a surface mine in the Athabasca, Canada oil sands. This environment is clearly unnatural and yet uninhabitable for humans too, subverting natureculture – there is no culture in this land, it is turned up and destroyed to preserve a culture that is spatially far away. The mining companies have not thought of what this means for the geese. It is hard to imagine what these birds perceive of their world, it can only to them be an uneasy, hostile expanse. These sorts of images make me think what will exist in these empty spaces, and what the significance of empty expanses like this are in the future.