THE SPECULATIVE MACHINE: ART AS A TOOL AGAINST CLIMATE CRISIS

In the framework of SUPERFLEX: We Are All in the Same Boat exhibition at the Museum of Art and Design (MOAD) at Miami Dade College (MDC), a series of public activities under the title The Speculative Machine is held. Two of the activities were executed on February 21 and 28 and other two will take place on Thursday, April 4 and Saturday, April 6.

Inauguración de Superflex. Ph: Oriol Tarridas.

SUPERFLEX: We Are All in the Same Boat is a proposal of a homonymous collective of Danish artists who reside in the United States. In an extensive presentation, the exhibition exhibits a series of installations and audiovisual pieces that revolve around economic issues, corruption and financial crisis, migratory waves and the effects and possible consequences of climate change on a global scale.

From this perspective, The Speculative Machine program invites intellectuals, specialists from diverse fields and artists to discuss all these issues. The conferences held on the 21st  and 28th  of last month (Speculative Machine I: Tools for a Thawing World and Speculative Machine II: Specters of Climate, Community, and Corruption) were directed by Gean Moreno, curator of ICA Miami, and Stefanie Wakerfield, urban geographer and professor at Eugene Lang College, in the first case; and George Yúdice, Professor of critical theory and cultural studies at the University of Miami, Timothy A. Barber Executive Director of the Black Archives in Overtown, and former member of the City of Miami Historic and Environmental Preservation Board, and Mariana Boldu landscape architect and Board Member of the City of Miami Sea Level Rise Committee.

But what activities stay ahead?

Next Thursday will be held Speculative Machine III: Hard Evidence: The Visibilities and Invisibilities of a Changing Climate. Lead by Doctor and Professor at the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School for Marine and Atmospheric Science Brian J. Soden, together with Beka Economopoulos and Jason Jones, founders of the Natural History Museum and the Not An Alternative collective, the lecture will address a discussion with relation to the policies that shape nature representations. In addition, the specialists will propose strategies for the use of scientific data and will emphasize the commitment that cultural institutions must have regarding climate change.   

  

   

On the other hand, Speculative Machine IV: Workshop for A Sustainable Culture will close the program on Saturday, April 6. In this case, the artists and creators of the Not An Alternative collective will hold a workshop to educate on the collaboration that citizens and members of cultural institutions can make for the construction of a sustainable culture in collaboration with climate movements.

With a program that questions the established orders in today's society, The Speculative Machine programming is an excellent opportunity for those artists and citizens who want to commit themselves in an alternative way to the environmental crisis that threatens the 21st century. Without further comments, SUPERFLEX: We Are All in the Same Boat, the exhibition that is exhibited until April 26 in the MOAD gallery, is a manifestation of it.