Today, Blue Lab director Allison Carruth and creative director Barron Bixler delivered the keynote session at the 20th Anniversary Conference of the International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture (ISSRNC) in Venice, Italy.
The conference theme, Foundations and Fluidity, explores the linkages between myriad interconnected ecological problems such as climate change, pollution, nuclear proliferation and land sovereignty, particularly as they relate to water.
The program opened with Carruth's keynote talk, The Ocean Remade, in which she shared research for a new book project that considers competing visions of the ocean in the twenty-first century. Her keynote considered one such vision of the Pacific Ocean as a technological frontier, ripe for geoengineering, energy production and venture capital-backed seabed mining.
"Those with the most to gain from this vision profess a belief that technologies powering what has been called the blue economy—from marine cloud brightening to seabed mining—offer a kind of salvation from climate change," Carruth argued in the talk. "This world-building narrative can be understood in a larger history of technological utopianism that ascribes to engineers godlike powers to remake the Earth and its natural systems. As with its terrestrial parallels, the technotopia of blue tech conjures a future in which the planetary harms and hazards of past technologies are at once remedied and redeemed by yet-more advanced engineering."
Following Carruth's keynote, Bixler introduced the screening of a 15-minute work sample from the duo's documentary film, California on the Edge, which is currently in production. The screening marked to first time the filmmakers have publicly screened part of this film, on which they began work in 2023, and which is a flagship Blue Lab project.
"The movie is ostensibly about some of the ways that climate change has damaged ecosystems and upended lifeways along the California coast," Bixler shared in his remarks. "But it also considers climate change as a force multiplier of other entrenched social-environmental problems like pollution, coastal development and technology, resource extraction, ecosystem and species conservation, and environmental racism. That said, our film doesn’t linger in this undertow. Rather, it flows with people who are rolling up their sleeves to protect, repair or salvage the places they love and call home."
The screening from California on the Edge was followed by a lively discussion with Bixler, Carruth and the audience of about 125 conference-goers, who'd gathered for the event on Venice's San Servolo island.
The ISSRNC is a community of scholars interested in the intersections of religion, nature and culture. The organization's 20th anniversary conference was hosted by Università Ca' Foscari and Wake Forest University.
Barron Bixler and Allison Carruth on San Servolo island in Venice, Italy for their keynote session at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference.
Allison Carruth delivers her keynote talk, "The Ocean Remade," at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
Allison Carruth delivers her keynote talk, "The Ocean Remade," at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
Allison Carruth delivers her keynote talk, "The Ocean Remade," at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
Barron Bixler introduces a screening of "California on the Edge," the documentary film he and Allison Carruth are making, at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
Barron Bixler introduces a screening of "California on the Edge," the documentary film he and Allison Carruth are making, at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
Barron Bixler and Allison Carruth in conversation with the audience at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
Barron Bixler and Allison Carruth in conversation with the audience at the ISSRNC's 20th anniversary conference in Venice, Italy.
