Sarah Huber, the way back to the earth
“Growing medicinal plants, for me, is to find the way back to the earth, to reconnect with the living.”
ALTER- fosters the active sharing of challenges, knowledge and possible solutions for the transition period – cultural, climatic, energetic, economic, social – in high mountain regions.
It is a time to fill our imaginations with other stories and to encourage a learning process that would consist in letting ourselves be taught by the world.
“Growing medicinal plants, for me, is to find the way back to the earth, to reconnect with the living.”
Tradition, Medicinal plants.
Counterpoint frequencies, inaudible trails of the bees’ flight, dynamite heartbeats that shape a space in which time is no longer lineal.
Salt. Soil. Machine. Stone.
An immersion through the mouth of this mine, excavated since the XVth century. The air is dense, the tools are striking, the mountain is imploding. The compass of the machines. A lithium field. White and infinite horizon, among salt crystals, a voice is heard. The wind.
_Sonandes
Five senses to feel
Walking leads the steps of the walker from a point A to a point B. Between two points on a walking map, the landscape changes under the influence of human activities or natural processes. Its representation varies according to perceptions.
Experience the territory in a collective and sensory experience of conscious walking to feed a common narrative.
_Laurence Piaget-Dubuis & Sonandes
“In the forest you can easily feel the quality, the energy of peace and silence. And the mountains push us upwards, a bit like a call. They make us feel the link between the earth and the sky.”
Edition 2022
THE ANDES AND THE ALPS
Territories and worldviews
6.6-31.8 2022
ILLMATTER, Essays from the invisible
27-28.8 2022 Chandolin, Val d’Anniviers
Is it the invisible that has no matter or what we don’t want to see?
Where does the invisible inhabit and how is it part of our days, how does it affect our survival?
From invisibility, we deconstruct cultural codes and offer an immersion that opens up our perception.
To turn, to move, to change, these are the keys to urgency.
_ Artists Sonandes
“For me working with scientists is really important to have facts, understanding and a different kind of way into things.”
_Laura Harrington, TSOEG artist
“Interacting with an artist who gives us another point of view pushes us a little in our tracks and forces us to change our posture.”
_Christophe Randin, Biogeograph (UNIL-CIRM)
Lea Salamin has been a member of the Grimentz Fifres et Tambours society since 2015.
She thus became the society’s first female drummer, exactly 50 years after its foundation.
There are currently three female drummers in the ranks of the Fifres et Tambours du Val d’Anniviers.
Camille lives in one of the last chalets at the end of the village of Zinal, “l’Abris du bois Roux”. This chalet is located in a danger zone, the red zone, under a dike protecting the village.
Edition 2023
SENSITIVE ATMOSPHERES
We are the Weathers
1.7-31.8.2023
Under Gravity: experimental dialogues at altitude
26-27.8 2023 Chandolin, Val d’Anniviers
The mountains are a place to think about gravity – it is impossible to live on a peak. Everything is moving, the mountain is shifting, the materials that give it structure are falling away. How can we remain agile and move with the change now? We are in motion, part of a process, only passing through.
_ Artists TSOEG
The film In The Mind of an Eye brings together recordings of the TSOEG collective’s fieldwork during their residency in Val d’Anniviers as part of ALTER- 2023. These recordings are arranged in a new poetic composition of moving sounds and images. It was edited by TSOEG associate Mark Aitken. The collaborative film interweaves the sensations, memories and visions of each individual.
Co-produced by ALTER- 2023
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Glacier du Mountet (altitude 3100m)
Laura Harrington
Images:
’Crevassing’ on the glacier and inside the glacier – observing ice, microbes, and trust
Thanks:
Pascal Zufferey and E. Jackson
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Cabane du Grand Mountet CAS (altitude 2900m)
Carlo Rizzo
Images:
Constructing a landing strip for film documentation
Thanks:
Laura Harrington
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Glacier de Zinal (altitude 2600m)
François Leo Benner
Sounds:
Recording the movements of ice and water
Thanks:
Pascal Zufferey
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Lac de Châteaupré (altitude 2350m)
Luce Choules
Images:
From a survey of the lake edge
Notes:
Fieldwork documents (digital photography)
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Combavert (altitude 2200m)
Laura Harrington and Meredith Root-Bernstein
Images:
‘Cleambering’ with rock, river and caddisfly
Thanks:
Francois Leo Benner, Luce Choules and E. Jackson
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Pramarin (highest waymark, altitude 2050m)
Carlo Rizzo
Images:
Photo-documentation of various waymarks in Val d’Anniviers
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Illgraben (altitude 1950m)
Luce Choules
Images:
From a survey at the top of the debris flow
Notes:
Fieldwork documents (digital photography)
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Chandolin (highest museum, altitude 1880m)
E. Jackson
Images:
Petit Musée Lucquérand, St-Luc
Musée des Outils Anciens de Pinsec (MOAP), Pinsec
Maison-musée, Fang
Espace Ella Maillart, Chandolin
Maison du Remuage, Zinal
Chalet Madeleine, Ayer
Musée des Patoisants, Vissoie
La Maison de Grand-Maman, Grimentz
Cordonnerie Daniel, Ayer
Notes:
Nine fragments of a painting were momentarily installed in different museums in the Val d’anniviers during the summer of 2023. A photographic document of each intervention was made by the artist.
Thank you:
Déde Abbé, Claude Antille, Irene Baumann, Sébastien Chaudron, Anneliese Hollmann, Yvonne Jollien-Berclaz, Johann Massy, Jean-Yves Melly, Adriana Tenda Claude; Luce Choules and Virginie Poulin
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Vissoie (altitude 1200m)
François Leo Benner and Luce Choules
Sounds:
Recording patois readings and songs
Thanks:
Janine Barmaz-Chevier and patois speakers
TSOEG FIELDWORK
Fang (altitude 1000m)
E. Jackson and Luce Choules
Images:
Stills from films made inside the raccard at Fang
Notes:
Vilém Flusser – Essais sur la nature et la culture [Circé 2005, p88]
…the wind is invisible. Even so, it is a thing, I know this perfectly well, because it can be measured, weighed, and pinpointed within space. But it is invisible, and this confuses our sense of “reality,” which is a visual concept and not an auditory one. The wind confuses for example, the hierarchy imposed upon our minds by the syntax of our languages. There are things in nature that are visible, but inaudible. The Sun, the Moon, the stars, in sum, the celestial things: “Substantive” things. Because they are inaudible, they are distant, and we cannot get closer. That is because vision is the sense that separates us from things, and hearing is the sense that submerges us in them. The seen world is circumstance; the world we hear, is a participated world. The things of nature that are audible but invisible, such as a hurricane and the breeze, penetrate through our noses, mouths and pores. They are “verbal,” not “substantive.” They are voices that call us. They run in the opposite direction than that of our own voices and can be incomparably more powerful…