The Museum of Contemporary Art in Skopje (North Macedonia) hosted the grand opening of the exhibition ‘The Earth is Thinking All Along…’ on 6 November 2025, where we had the opportunity to present the video installation ‘Swamp-scapes of Care’ by the duo Katarzyna Pastuszak and Nat Chylińska in dialogue with the conceptual framework ‘Words cannot capture the swamp. How to re-sense swamp life?’ by Irena Chawrilska, coordinator of the More-than-Human Studies Lab programme at the Centre for Sustainable Development at the University of Gdańsk.
Curated by Rick Dolphijn, the exhibition features seven philosophers from around the globe engaging in dialogue with seven artists who share a similar sensitivity and approach to thinking about the planet. The starting points here are earth, words, images, sounds, smells and movement, which create a space for encounter.
The exhibition’s creators wanted to design a space where philosophers, artists, guests, curators and the more-than-human world could interact. Starting with the earth scattered on the floor, its smell and the experience of it underfoot, through listening to the sounds of the planet via sound installations, shamanic spirituality from Manchuria and Inner Mongolia, to the tactile and acoustic experience of Thymus Vulgaris, the audience is challenged to reflect on the condition of the planet and the networks of interdependence in which we constantly exist.
‘’The video installation by Katarzyna Pastuszak and Nat Chylińska explores the interplay of sound and visuals, and the entanglements of humans and other-than-humans. The wetland is symbolic of the passage of time and the cyclical nature of life: the cellular processes of the swamp, such as decomposition, composting and decay, embody the hope of new growth. The artist sings: ‘There are tides in the body’, in reference to the works of Virginia Woolf and Astrida Neimanis. The concept of tides encourages us to consider our identities as dynamic and ever-evolving, and to develop a deeper understanding of how our identities are inherently connected to our environments — the waters and lands (wetlands) that we inhabit. Although we flow with the tides of the swamp, we are afraid of being ‘swamped’, we are scared of our fluid identities. Our artists work with female swamps — fragile, creative, porous ecosystems — with care” – said Irena Chawrilska.
‘’Swamp-scapes of Care is an exploration of being in the landscape and experiencing it through the porous presence of a feeling and thinking body, with tenderness and attentiveness, surrendering to the movements of the watery landscape and co-creating moving relations-scapes, overlapping temporalities and materialities” – said Katarzyna Pastuszak.
‘’This video installation is the first iteration of an ongoing project that together with Irena Chawrilska and the music and video artists (Nat Chylińska and Mariusz Krawczyk) we wish to develop in the coming months, exploring different paths of relating to,moving/thinking-with swamps to activate the polyphony of stories that we can weave together’’ – added Katarzyna Pastuszak.
A special issue of Large Glass. Journal of Contemporary Art, Culture and Theory will soon be published, exploring the issues raised during the collaboration between artists and philosophers in greater depth.
The participating artists and thinkers are: Ferran Lega and Christian Alonso; Katarzyna Pastuszak and Irena Chawrilska; Signe Liden and Rick Dolphijn; Han Xiaohan and Kristiina Koskentola; Sunah Choi and Alex Taek-Gwang Lee; Tihomir Topuzovski; and Shintaro Miyawaki and Toshiya Ueno.
More information: Museum of Contemporary Art » The Earth is Thinking All Along: A creative geophilosophical travelogue
The next stage of the project, ‘The Earth is Thinking All Along…’, will take place in June at the Radius Centre for Contemporary Art and Ecology in Delft.
Fot. Museum of Contemporary Art Skopje