Sea blindness

22. September bis 22. Oktober 2023 Zypern

What lies beneath the waves

Cesar Escudero Andaluz, PHD Student und Lecturer bei Interface Cultures, nimmt an der Ausstellung teil.

NeMe is pleased to present the exhibition and accompanying programme of events Sea Blindness: What Lies Beneath the Waves. The project comprises an international group exhibition, a seminar, two screening events, and a curators’ talk.

Sea Blindness situates the Mediterranean Sea at the heart of artistic, scientific and critical discussions. Featuring the work of 10 artists working across different media, as well as the participation of researchers and filmmakers, the exhibition and programme of events shed light on the major “tectonic movements” and the geopolitical, ecological and humanitarian phenomena that unfold in the Mediterranean basin but remain shielded from public scrutiny for a variety of reasons, Many human interventions in the Mediterranean are commonly disregarded, as in the cases of submarine communication cables, the shipping industry and other critical infrastructures because of their lack of visibility or because they concern geopolitical relations, and as such seem too abstract or remote. Other aspects, however, have to contend with the indifference of the already oversaturated attention span of the general public, as often happens with matters related to environmental degradation and migration.

Curated by Régine Debatty and Carmen Salas, Sea blindness aims to help us rethink how we relate to the Mediterranean sea, how the relations and cooperation between the Northern and the Southern, Eastern and Western borders of the basin unfold, as well as the role the region plays in world’s geopolitics and in securing economic, environmental and social prosperity.

Artistic and research engagements with these topics throw light on both collective concerns and political responses to challenges arising in the Mediterranean basin. Through their work, the participating artists and scholars, explore the infrastructures, phenomena, tensions and relationships unfolding in and around the Mediterranean, revealing on one hand, the complex mechanisms of humans, food and material flows taking place in the Mediterranean Sea, and their impact at a social, political and environmental level, and on the other hand, the importance of sea protection and conservation for social, economic and environmental prosperity. The exhibition will also present artists that propose critical, speculative and sometimes satirical approaches to understanding the growing impact that technology has on political and territorial realities, the geopolitical and mass-surveillance issues surrounding the long-standing practice of undersea cabling in the Mediterranean, as well as poetical proposals to reimagine our relationship to marine ecosystems.

The artists, speakers, and filmmakers participating in Sea Blindness are: Futurefarmers with Ignacio Chapela & Alfonso Borragán, Border Forensics & Giovanna Reder, Moritz Frischkorn, César Escudero Andaluz, Heba Y. Amin, Ingo Niermann & Eduardo Navarro, Ruba Salameh, Hypercomf, Jafra Abu Zoulouf, Dr. Manfred A. Lange, Denis Delestrac, Ana Serna & Paula Iglesias and Corina Schwingruber Ilić, Charalambos Theopemptou.

www.neme.org/blog/sea-blindness-press