How are Indigenous concepts of kinship, multiperspectivity, and territoriality translated into cinematic world-projections that open up alternative approaches to the ecological crises? How do Indigenous filmmaking practices from Turtle Island / Abya Yala link struggles against resource extraction and pollution with an ontological turn and with distinct production modes of audiovisual culture? The project will examine how experimental film and video art stages connections between language, culture, and landscape that reveal the consequences of extractivist and imperialist worldviews while articulating alternative epistemes (SP 1). Drawing on the work of activist video collectives, it will describe how documenting land theft, resistance, and Indigenous everyday practices serves as a form of political, decolonial work (SP 2). Furthermore, we aim to explore how Indigenous cosmologies and forms of knowledge are realized through "shamanistic" world projections (SP 3). These artistic interventions against the destruction of the foundations of life do more than raising awareness about the consequences of the Western lifestyle, because the root causes of global ecological crises lie not only in the technological processes of industrial societies but in the underlying knowledge systems and hierarchies.

Head of Project

Jun.-Prof. Dr. Matthias Grotkopp (SP 1)

Doctoral Researcher

Paula Leitenberger (SP 2)

Elisabeth Mohr (SP 3)

Student Assistant

Pablo Jonathan Salinas