This lecture is part of the series Cosmic Weaving which presents Maria Cynkier’s research into the relationships between nature, culture, ecology, and technology. Its point of departure is a series of lectures by Alexander Humboldt about the cosmos given in the building of Maxim Gorki Theater almost 150 years ago. Responding to these lectures, Cynkier invites us to reconsider connections between humans, non-humans, and our shared environments as a never-ending activity of animated forces. Speculation and fiction will serve as important methodologies for relating to the world around us, a multitude of viewpoints will inform experimentation, and play will support radical imaginaries.
For her lecture Planetary Worlding. Cybernetic Weaving. Interspecies Kinship, Cynkier will discuss affect and entanglement within the planetary network of human and more-than-human dependencies. She will consider how these complex relationships expand the definitions of humanity and cognition, and how technological and scientific paradigms can be challenged by creative language and world-building.
