Sol y Sombra: a Journey up the Orinoco River

FESCH.TV INFORMIERT:

Sol y Sombra: a Journey up the Orinoco River
New methods in mapping shadow policies & shadow ecologies
to support environmental diplomacy in the Venezuelan Amazon

Led by architects and urbanists Alejandro Haiek @the.public.machinery & Xenia Adjoubei @artaslabour
in collaboration with Tomas Mena @tomasmena & Luis Pimentel @lpimentelm29

Supported by Umeå School of Architecture
In Partnership with Fundación Espacio & Department of Design + Architecture, Simon Bolivar University, Venezuela.

Sol y Sombra is a project laboratory, which develops new methodologies in research, representation and proposition for territories of high ecosystemic and cultural value, responding to conditions of the devaluation of human life and ecological depletion.

The analysis of the contemporary condition of the Orinoco River was inspired by Alexander von Humboldt’s expedition to discover its source, he was the first western explorer to travel up river in the 19th century. The investigation is carried out in an interdisciplinary way, including scientific, economic and artistic perspectives, drawing on hydrology, geology, ecology, engineering, literature, anthropology and uses emergent mapping, surveying and modelling technologies.
The research and modelling tool presented could facilitate testing prognoses of positive development scenarios for one of the most precious natural environments on our planet to uphold alternative values systems and future economies.

The Sol y Sombra project lab has prototyped an interactive tool, for the analysis and 3D visualisation of territories such as the Orinoco River in the Venezuelan Amazon, which reveals its geographical, political and economic complexity, by geolocating and overlaying interests, conflicts and possibilities. The tool highlights potential development opportunities, locations for emergent markets in clean natural resources and new labour economies and suggest these can generate added value for local and global communities.

Assistants

Maria Cabarcas
Ksenia Davydova
Adelina Farvazova
Kasimir Suter Winter
Julia Wladysiak

Our Experts

Reynaldo Alsina, medical outreach / Director CUMIS UCV
Ricardo Avella, Urbanist & researcher Amazon ecologies
Ethel Baraona, Critic, writer and curator / dpr-barcelona
Fabio Capra Ribeiro, PhD in Urbanism IUAV Venice / spatial & environmental justice
Juan Cristóbal Castro, Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaiso / extractivism as cultural phenomenon
Ana Maria Duran Calisto, Theorist and Doctoral Candidate UCLA / Yale School of Architecture
Eduardo Kairuz, Director, Global Extraction Observatory (GEO); Lecturer, Monash University
Liana Malva, Artist, musician, singer / Nature activism
Carmen Mendoza Arroyo, PhD in Urbanism, Assistant Director School of Architecture / UIC Barcelona
Franco Micucci, Head of the Department of Design & Architecture / Simón Bolívar University, Caracas
Karla Montauti, architect, artist, educator / Buenos Aires University
Eduardo Mouhtar, architect / Orinoco territorial researcher
Maria Isabel Peña, Architect, Former Director Instituto de Urbanismo / Central University of Venezuela
Elisa Silva, architect, academic / Enlace Arquitectura / University of Toronto
Luis Romero, Artist / Contemporary Art Curator. Sheroanawe Hakihiiwe: arte y contexto. Alto Orinoco
Cristina Vollmer de Burelli, Founder, SOS Orinoco / Founding Co-Chair, The Global Leaders Program / Founding Executive Director V5 Initiative

Researchers

Cesar Barbaran – Venezuela
Ellinor Bolt
Vitor Coelho – Brazil
Santiago Dominguez – Venezuela
Ludvig Dovberg – Sweden
Claudia Durre – Venezuela
Augusta Fišerytė – Lithuania
Andrea Horn – Venezuela
Mauro Izarra – Venezuela
Beatriz Kolster – Venezuela
Hana Osman – Sweden
Gabriel Valles
Cesar Andres Velando Garcia – Sweden
Anastasia Niki Xenodochidi – Greece