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A COMPANION FOR PRECARIOUS TIMES JACK FABER & ANNA SHRAER editors A COMPANION FOR PRECARIOUS TIMES JACK FABER & ANNA SHRAER editors © All Eco Noir rights reserved to Jack Faber and Anna Shraer. All image rights reserved to the artists. All text rights reserved to the authors and The Academy of Fine Arts at the University of the Arts Helsinki. PUBLISHER The Academy of Fine Arts at the University of the Arts Helsinki COVER IMAGE Na’ama Miller Dark Shadow 2006, Graphite on paper, 172x150 cm GRAPHIC DESIGN Jack Faber, Marjo Malin PRINTING Grano Oy, 2020 ISBN: 978-952-353-407-0 (printed) ISBN: 978-952-353-408-7 (pdf) Contents 11 Eco Noir – An Introduction 213 A She-Tiger in the Garden of Eden Jack Faber & Anna Shraer Kalle Hamm 25 Eating the Problem 223 Marine Panic Yvette Watt Siiri Siltala 39 Recovering Territories 243 Family Gardens Naomi Roelf Mohamed Sleiman Labat & Pekka Niskanen 59 Bug Wars 269 The lost continent of Mu or the search for paradise Amir Vudka Marte Kiessling 107 Plant Allies: Agents and Ambassadors 281 A letter to Rosita and the mango Ido Hartogsohn Lea Kantonen 127 Natural Acts 296 Acknowledgements Nir Nadler 300 Biographies 175 My Family and Other Animals 307 Image Index Guy Königstein 190 Becoming Any Thing Daniel Peltz 195 Rendezvous projected Mika Elo 205 Dearest Pine Annette Arlander This book is dedicated to James, Monina and Mia Faber, our closest friends and dearest companions. JACK FABER & ANNA SHRAER Eco Noir – An Introduction The images of the Australian bush engulfed by firestorms, never before documented in human history, hit us like a crashing wave. All the wild mass of this thing called nature coming straight at us – devastatingly merciless and beyond breathtaking. That physical embodiment of the untamed, roaring down to crush all illusions of control and imagined mastery over the elements. Watching these towering fires and thick smoke covering half the continent, followed by destructive thunderstorms, was like watching the planes hit the twin towers in slow motion at the turn of the century. Almost two decades apart, the same particular sense of sheer dread and astonishment grabs us when confronted by such spectacles of horror,1 faced with the eerie consequences of humanity’s follies. It seems they come back with vengeance to show 1 Baudrillard, The spirit of terrorism and other essays. Jack Faber, Danger – Marine Life, 2020, Mixed media, 32x43 cm 12 JACK FABER & ANNA SHRAER ECO NOIR - AN INTRODUCTION 13 us how far things actactually have gotten. While understanding endangered existence's perspective of life on earth as an enduring permeates us slowly, the velocity of nature’s reaction is accelerat- struggle. This gritty struggle, conducted by women and men caught ing – soon to surpass our grasp. in moral ambiguity, lead for the most part to violent collisions, leav- The idea for this book was ignited in the wake of such cata- ing havoc in their path. strophic eventualities and conceived to serve as a reaction to the In a sense it seems we are still walking (and rather hastily) this current climate emergency. It is a collective attempt to examine in- same path paved by the legacy of totalitarian regimes, manifested in teractions with other species and our shared environment through the all-encompassing corporate logic and its dominant short-term political and personal views. profit ideology. Between the constant distractions propagated by The cultural concept of Noir originated in the aftermath of the the ethically dubious algorithm-based Attention Economy, the ex- unprecedented destruction, brought by the fascist regimes of the ponentially growing fears festered by the Security Economy and the first half of the 20th century. This ashen and burnt ground has prov- current coronavirus crisis, we are very much at a loss. While the en fertile for the original, disillusioned view Noir conveys on the demands for emergency measures needed to decelerate the climate violence humanity brought upon itself, resulting in colossal collat- crisis are being ignored by almost all governments and corporates, eral damage. Noir, as an almost feral – and completely fresh lit- as well as by most of humanity,4 it is evident we lost our grip on the erary and cinematic approach2 – suggested a realistic yet highly state of the ecosystem. Instead we have been expanding our role in stylized reflection upon the inherent abuse of power, and the fa- the accelerated destruction. tal consequences of its shadowy allure. This abuse of power – em- The same questionable tools of the Attention Economy, that aim bedded in all social hierarchies, whether fascist, communist or to distract us from the literally burning facts, are used in seeming- capitalist – was criticized by the new narratives, inventive storytell- ly democratic processes.5 They solidify the influential positions of ing and audio-visual forms. Noir refused diverting its (and our) gaze those who are indifferent to the notion that their actions (or per- from the darkness of the corruptive qualities hidden in the center haps even worse – inaction) are burning our collective lungs. From of our dominant ideologies.3 It kept a sharp eye to the places where the Amazon to Australia, through the American West Coast and our socially deflected dreams are shaped as individual nocturnal the Arctic Circle, their spur seems to be dividends promised by the visions – nightmares in disguise. As humanity was raising from the highly damaging logging, fossil fuels and animal agriculture indus- catastrophes of the last century – the great epistemological rup- tries.6 In Australia alone, the bushfire season of 2019-20 took the ture of the Second World War and the Holocaust – Noir brought an 4 Casper, “Climate Justice: Holding Governments and Business Accountable for the Climate Crisis.” 2 Noir is often considered as a film genre, although it is actually a wide cultural 5 Bueno, The attention economy: Labour, time and power in cognitive capitalism. movement encompassing literature, art and many cinematic categories. See: 6 Escobar, “Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon is still rising sharply.” And: Shrader, ‘notes on film noir’ in Film Comment. 8-13. Taylor, and Watts, “Revealed: the 20 firms behind a third of all carbon 3 Ibid. emissions.” And: Tullo et al. “Environmental impact of livestock farming and 14 JACK FABER & ANNA SHRAER ECO NOIR - AN INTRODUCTION 15 lives of over a billion wild animals, bringing many to the verge of Following this notion by T.J. Demos, we find that nowadays all cul- extinction.7 It is clearer than ever that our ancient relationship tural agents play a crucial role in the fight for climate justice, from with nature has been broken, and as John Berger suggested, the both sides of the trenches. The difference between accelerating actual presence of animals – which used to be at the center of our crisis and actively striving for species survival is often a question existence – is now marginalized, replaced and reduced to a spec- of awareness. Awareness to our conditioned conduct, single serv- tacle.8 The responsible parties for these broken ties resonate the ing ethics and language we tend to use and toss with little thought. same irresponsible bureaucratic approach and corporate logic, Especially in these days of growing social polarity, catalyzed by the that have been proven extremely harmful to all life on earth. We spreading pandemic and fatal climatic changes.10 are indeed living now an Eco Noir existence. In light of the current situation and the threshold of climate ca- TERRITORIES OF TERMINOLOGY tastrophe we’re hovering over, we wish to raise anew awareness and Ecocide is the official term coined to denounce the environmental empathy towards our environment. Bringing our focal point to the destruction the American use of Agent Orange brought to Viet- importance of nature and our co-inhabitants, we call for attention nam’s ecosystem, as part of its covert chemical warfare.11 It echoes to the connections between climate crimes and the corporate ac- the genocides committed throughout history – now encompassing tivities which are deeply embedded in our personal lives. Therefore, the entirety of the world ecology. Despite the fact the concept of the aim of this work is to encourage positive cultural actions for the Ecocide has been around since the 1970s, it is still foreign sounding betterment of our lives with all other species and the fragile and to most of the population of our damaged planet. Dissimilarly, it unique environments we share. creates a paralyzing effect among those familiar with its impend- ing threat. My conviction is that environmentally engaged art bears the potential To bridge this binary gap, countering both the general apathy to both rethink politics and politicize art’s relation to ecology, and its and corruptive short-term profit ideology, we recognize a dire need thoughtful consideration proves nature’s inextricable binds to economics, for quite a different attitude and the appropriate emancipatory ter- technology, culture, and law at every turn.9 minology to reflect it. In this call for active participation we position the linguistic scope of the term Eco Noir as an approach for a deep- er, emotional understanding of interspecies relations – framed in the context of climate crisis and its economic and cultural accelerators. Precision Livestock Farming as a mitigation strategy.” 7 Filkov et al. “Impact of Australia’s catastrophic 2019/20 bushfire season on 10 Miles-Novelo and Anderson. “Climate change and psychology: Effects of rapid communities and environment. Retrospective analysis and current trends.” global warming on violence and aggression.” 8 Berger, Why Look at Animals?. 11 Zierler, The invention of ecocide: Agent Orange, Vietnam, and the scientists who 9 Demos, Decolonizing nature: Contemporary art and the politics of ecology.