TransHuman Saunter: The Other Tree, the Other Human and Other Stories of a City

Abstract

TransHuman Saunter: The Other Tree, the Other Human and Other Stories of a City

Through geolocative technology, the other activates the streets of the city and botanical gardens of Meanjin/ Brisbane, deploying storytelling to present multispecies narratives pivoting around the Indian Banyan Tree (Bangad) in a Transhuman Saunter. The other here refers to women of colour who strive to create a place and a sense of belonging while facing intersectional marginalisation and the problem of articulating relational and deep sensitivities towards a tree that has been reduced to a non-human resource. The project sees four female creatives engaging and inviting the audience to saunter alongside the “non-human” Indian Banyan tree. They weave layers of wayfinding, and mapping, with visual and sonic forms connecting the personal and local to distant homes and places across oceans and time periods, intrinsically connected by the Banyan. Consequently, the project opens portals for culturally diverse standpoints from Samoa, India, Vietnam and Thailand to infuse the public spaces of a botanical garden, the CBD and the Southbank precinct at Meanjin/ Brisbane. The creative works bridge the past with the present. Multiple histories: not limited to colonial trade, intertwine as connections between cultural, historical, feminist, spiritual, artistic and ecological themes and collaborative work with a pluralistic approach arrive at non-traditional outcomes. By utilising participatory processes, interventions are developed, overcoming the isolation and silencing wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic: technology is deployed not just to situate the works in locations but to interconnect and weave together the artists with audiences and to welcome a robust and emerging commentary. In this presentation, Natasha (India-Australia) and Agapetos (Samoa-Australia) present vignettes of the project, combing through sections of the walks guided by the Bangad while searching for belonging and respite in the streets and parks of the city. The project contributes other ways of knowing: the trees becoming sites for gathering and inviting cyclic returns to place. The audience can journey to these sites, be surprised by new and multidisciplinary interpretations, and be accompanied by technological activations that blur the physical and the virtual. Corresponding with the artwork, the presentation will mix and remix storytelling and performance with theoretical perspectives to deliver an experience of togetherness between humans and nonhumans. The Transhuman Saunter is accessible via a smartphone or a computer at https://research.qut.edu.au/morethanhuman/projects/thsp/