Louisa Marajo is a visual artist born in Martinique, living and working in Paris. She started working on Sargassum in 2018, first by integrating them into her canvasses, then by taking photographs to narrate different stories, that she scatters into different pieces to compose new sculptures. She is inspired by the Schumpeterian concept of constructive destruction and Kurt Schwitters’ approach of orderly chaos, trying to adopt an alternative perspective on ecological disasters. She contacted the Tout-Monde Foundation in 2019 to collaborate on an artistic project on Sargassum.

Vanessa Selk is the Executive and Artistic Director of the Tout-Monde Foundation, living and working between Miami and New York. Growing up between the French Caribbean and Europe, she directed several theater companies and plays in France and the U.S., and worked as a Diplomat for the French government for eleven years, serving both on political and cultural matters, including as Cultural Attaché in Miami where she developed a 3 year Festival and program dedicated to Caribbean contemporary art.

Louisa and Vanessa are the original duo of HOMO SARGASSUM: they conceived it together in 2019, with the curatorial support of Dr. Tatiana Flores, and have been writing, organizing and developing the project ever since.

In this Cross-Interview, both ask questions and answer to each other. As they are both interviewees, there is no hierarchy.

1.  Vanessa Selk: What was your first encounter with the Sargassum? 

Louisa Marajo: I don't know exactly how or when this encounter took place because it was multiple: through the media where information got mixed with reflections; through memories that were mixed with a desire to update them. 

The first time I worked with sargassum, I took it from the sea, put it underwater to remove some salt, sprinkled an old canvas with the seaweed and fixed it with resin. I wanted to superimpose two chaos, two memories: the one of my painted canvas with the sargassum chaos. It was completely experimental and not very ecological with the use of resin. 

Time passed and I started to use photos of the sargassum that I was picking up on the beaches of Martinique, using their image or representation. A distance arose, it was the beginning of the transformation. I felt that one could build a new world with these Sargassum, seen at first as something negative.

I had the feeling that these invading sargassum were the marine incarnation of “creative destruction”, as conceptualized by the Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter, that is, what destroys something but must create something else to replace it, to surpass it, to transform it, because life is an infinite Metamorphosis.

We must innovate with the Anthropocene and capitalist scourges that destroy themselves but can be reversed. We must transgress our current vision of ecological disasters and turn them into a moment of positive breakthrough, of creativity for the future.

2. Louisa Marajo: What do you expect from the HOMO SARGASSUM project?

Vanessa Selk: It is hard to have high expectations in 2020. Uncertainty has leaked into all spheres: cultural institutions, politics, sponsoring, privacy, dreams…everything is trembling and trying to adapt. But two things have not changed: on the one hand, environmental issues keep worsening, on the other hand, creativity has not stopped. These are two different observations, but they meet in the HOMO SARGASSUM project. I therefore expect the project to be able to build that bridge between art and science to think about new ways of dealing with the sargassum, and to highlight that it is not just a Caribbean concern, but a planetary issue. After shortly hesitating about the future of the project in times of global confinement, the COVID-19 pandemic actually increased the urgency of the project, as it acted as an additional threat to the vulnerability of those whose lungs were already affected by the toxic gases of the sargassum. HOMO SARGASSUM aims at highlighting these shared vulnerabilities and telling the stories of collective and individual resilience.

3. VS: How does the public react to the Sargassum in your work?

LM: I can't answer for the public. I could imagine that they feel a certain chaotic fusion.

4. LM: How did you get your ideas for the project?

VS: From our collaboration! We both had different references, sources and experiences. Bringing them together expanded our horizons. I spent months reading books and articles about the sargassum and other related issues, talking to experts and curators, such as Dr. Tatiana Flores. My research on the subject quickly led to one inevitable observation: we needed to include scientists and researchers in this dominantly artistic project. And this led to another conclusion: science offering a Western approach to the phenomenon, we also needed to include other perspectives, including Caribbean spiritual and philosophical thinking on nature and disasters. So, my ideas came from all these horizons and sources: artistic, poetic, historic, political, scientific, technological, philosophical, spiritual…and all were intricately connected to each other, forming one creative life circle. And beyond the connections between all fields, it was key to also link the Caribbean with other regions, such as West Africa and the Gulf of Mexico that are impacted by the sargassum proliferation. Finally, while writing the narrative of the project, it was essential to me that it be understood by anyone, coming from any background, and not limited to an artistic elite. I hope we achieved this objective so far.

5. VS: What do you hope to change or achieve with the HOMO SARGASSUM project?

LM: I wish to create a common and creative solidarity around this phenomenon because it becomes obvious that tomorrow's world will be built on the ruins created by this "old" world that we still cannot overcome. 

6. LM: What is the place of ecological issues in art today?

VS: Art is politics. And one of our major international political debates today is the environment. Not because we believe or not in scientific facts about global warming, but because disasters are political. For they impact people’s lives, property and their environment, and therefore involve governments and media. As ecological issues become this highly politicized sphere, they attract artists who position themselves as political actors, activists, or artivists. They want to actively contribute to raising awareness about planetary concerns, and not just create in a disconnected bubble. All of the participating artists of HOMO SARGASSUM have something to say about oceanic or environmental pollution and climate change, even if through very diverse channels. In addition, I believe that new generations among the public or buyers are also asking the art world to assume greater environmental responsibility. Finally, due to recurring natural threats such as hurricanes or sea level rise in the Caribbean, often accentuated by a colonial or post-colonial context, ecological issues probably take an even larger place in artistic productions of the region.

7. VS: You are also a poet, Louisa. You write about Sargassum in your poetry. If you communicated directly with the Sargassum, what would you say?

LM:

- How beautiful you are in your mystery, savage, sacred sargasso, deliver me!

- Why are you fascinated by my existence?

- Perhaps because you escape and invade me?

- Are you chasing after what you don't understand?

- Maybe I dream of taming us: when I look at you "in the sun, I'm cold".

8. LM: Do you feel HOMO SARGASSUM?

VS: Absolutely, haha! I haven’t learned apnea yet, but I love scuba diving precisely for this reason: you become one with a whole new universe, the ocean, breathing underwater like in the womb of your mother, floating and observing creatures you rarely see…these are very meditative and rare privileged moments for me. Also, being Caribbean, like the Homo Sargassum, my ancestors come from West Africa, Burkina Faso in my case, according to my family’s genealogic researches. Like the sargassum transatlantic sea belt, they have made the long journey crossing the Atlantic Ocean, drifting. Drifting is something that certainly characterizes both, my personality and my work, as I never remain too long in one place, trying to absorb the nutrients of the currents carrying me through life. On a more pragmatic level, I am far from being the fully ecological being that we all need to be to let Earth rest, but I am working on it.

9. VS: Bonus question: Is love between man and Sargasso possible?

LM: 

Love exists

Wherever there is desire

Disinterested, as well as impulsive and lightning.

When I look at the Sargassum

I walk through her,

As I walked her face and wrist

As well as the echo of her presence,

To draw it,

I follow the path of her thoughts

Lost and passionate,

When I dream about her.

How can this plant, this golden flower 

Cause so many disasters?

How can this woman

that you like 

can hurt you sometimes?

That's what Love is all about

Everything and its opposite

The Sargassum, counter-symbol of Wisdom

Is like this woman, this man

That you love

Full of its Ambivalence,

This definition of Love:

A whirlwind of storms and peace

Who can't get over the dust from the sea?

A beauty containing its destructive invasive

Power.