DEEP WEATHER | 2013
VIDEO ESSAY, 9 MIN.
Deep Weather comprises ‘Carbon Geologies’, set in the tar sands of the boreal forests of Northern Canada, and ‘Hydro Geographies’, set in the near-permanently flood-threatened Bangladesh. The connection is pursued through two narratives, one about oil, the other about water – vital ‘ur-liquids’ that form the undercurrents of all narrations as they are activating profound changes in the planetary ecology.
After the oil peak, ever dirtier, remote and deeper layers of carbon resources are being accessed now. Aerial recording of the devastated crust of Alberta opens the view into the dark lubricant geology. Aggressive mining and steam processing of the tar-sands are impinging on environmental and human rights as they devastate territories of First Nation people.
Climate change, exasperated by projects such as the Canadian tar sands, puts the life of large world populations in danger. Melting Himalayan ice fields, rising planetary sea levels and extreme weather events increasingly impose an amphibian lifestyle on the Bangladeshi population. Gigantic efforts are made by the community to build protective mud embankments. Hands-on, machine-less work by thousands is what climate change will mean for most people in the Deltas of the global south. These are the measures taken by populations who progressively have to live on water when large parts of Bangla will be submerged and water is declared the territory of citizenship.
