As part of an artistic and geo-philosophical project on the Earth, O Acontecimento da Terra (The Earth as Event) is a new artistic strategy proposed around the materials of the Earth. The Earth as Event regards the entry of the planet into History, not as the foundation of it, but as an event in it. It is given a new visibility by challenging the paradigms and imagery around it, of which the inhabitants of the planet were the sole focus.
The appearance of era globalisation, which permitted amongst others the taking of the first satellite photograph of the planet and space travel, has underlined that art is required to be created at a planetary level, as the problems it arises can be recorded globally. In fact, there are no local solutions to the climate crisis, the scarcity of resources, the poverty and violence that is crippling the Earth.
The project O Acontecimento da Terra explored several practices of contemporary art, namely painting, sculpture, installation and cinema. The idea behind this piece is to focus on very specific materials, such as rare soil, white and black and fossil coals, originating from all over the planet: they are light and shadow materials. These materials, which after being extracted and worked on, in pictorial and installation pieces, allow for another kind of interrogation around the Earth. Developed within the depth of the ground, «The Earth as Event» wants to provide a dialogue between the land, the soil and the Earth. This exchange is established through the combination of the video image, providing a new perspective, and the original soundtrack of the piece, made up by the sounds recorded when taping the wind and manifestations of the Earth.
The whole is dominated by the idea of measuring the importance of this introduction into history, which only perceptible through art and can allow us to gain a new awareness.
Romy Castro is an integrated Post-Doctoral Researcher analysing different geological matters of the Earth at ICNOVA – Culture, Mediation and Arts (CM&A) at FCSHUNL PhD in Communication Sciences, with the specialisation in Art and Communication. MA in Aesthetics and Art Philosophy with the dimension of Phenomenology and Hermeneutic from the Faculdade de Letras University of Lisbon. Degrees in Painting from Facultad Complutense de Bellas Artes de Madrid. Degree in Fine Arts-Painting from Faculdade de Belas Artes University of Lisbon. Intervening in several artistic and scientific investigation areas, she has been making innumerable individual and collective exhibitions of Painting/Installation/Sculpture, Photography, as well as experimental work in Video. She has also participating in several conferences and studies on Aesthetics, Art Philosophy, Phenomenology, Hermeneutic, Communication Sciences, Ciberculture, among others, and has publishing several articles in books and specialised magazines.
