January - May 2024, Rotterdam
Shifted and forgotten.
Hybrid landscape is about the change, shift and forgetting of the landscape. Hybridity in biology is the blending of qualities of two different type of species with a hybrid reproduction as result. The human impact on the environment has led to an increase in hybridization. In essence, every landscape is a hybrid, a blend of ecology, technology, culture, social structures and political power.
The hybrid landscape is about blending between realities, of the realities you think you know and the one you do not know. The project is about the passing of the time and a continuous metamorphosis of generations. Hybridity is in other way to see the co-constituting of relations between entities(Booth, 2013, p. 534).
Our collective memory of the Dutch anthropogenic landscape is based on what we know from our own observation and from observation by previous generations. The lack of experience, memory and knowledge to form a good baseline to observe change is also called the 'Shifting baseline syndrome' (SBS). SBS is a psychological and sociological phenomenon whereby each human generation sees the natural condition in which it was raised as normal (Soga and Gaston, 2018). The term was first used by Daniel Pauly, he pointed out that fishermen and marine scientists, saw the population size of fish and the variety of species that occurred in the begin over their careers as the baseline on which they evaluate changes (Pauly, 1995)
Individuals see their own baseline as the base on which they evaluate their reality in comparison to the changing natural environment. This phenomenon prevents us from seeing environmental degradation that occurs over a longer period. Being blind to see degradation is also called change blindness, it is the human negligence to perceive change in the natural environment (Argeloo, 2022, p. 42).
On the base of SBS is the extinction of experience. Through digitization, individualization and the reduction of our moving radius, we become alienated from the natural environment with results in consequently ignorance and apathy for our environment (Argeloo, 2022, p. 42). SBS can occur in two forms: personal amnesia when individuals see their own perception as the norm (Papworth et al., 2009, p. 93) or generational amnesia when that perception from their own experience is not carried out on to future generations (Papworth et al., 2009, p. 93). The baseline shifts, becomes blurred and is slowly being forgotten.
We should not only look at the state of our natural environment from the point of view of the recent population data of species and from reliable and traceable (scientific) observations, but also from historical and archaeological research. Looking in a hybrid way at the landscape could help to make the shift visible and help us remember. We should ask ourselves: what is the baseline?
By 3d-scanning the existing natural environment. I documented these environments and at a moment in time on micro scale. You archive It is a registration of the degradation and the shifting. With the use of the scans, I created a new landscape, an expansion and blurriness of observable reality.
References:
Argeloo, M., 2022. Natuuramnesie: hoe we vergeten zijn hoe de natuur er vroeger uitzag. Uitgeverij Atlas Contact, Amsterdam ; Antwerpen.
Booth, K.I., 2013. Deep Ecology, Hybrid Geographies, and Environmental Management’s Relational Premise. Environ. Values 22, 523–543. https://doi.org/10.3197/096327113X13690717320829
Papworth, S.K., Rist, J., Coad, L., Milner‐Gulland, E.J., 2009. Evidence for shifting baseline syndrome in conservation. Conserv. Lett. 2, 93–100. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-263X.2009.00049.x
Pauly, D., 1995. Anecdotes and the shifting baseline syndrome of fisheries. Trends Ecol. Evol. 10, 430. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0169-5347(00)89171-5
Soga, M., Gaston, K.J., 2018. Shifting baseline syndrome: causes, consequences, and implications. Front. Ecol. Environ. 16, 222–230. https://doi.org/10.1002/fee.1794