Video Projection: Confluence and Annihilation of the social continuum in Patagonia

Video Projection: Confluence and Annihilation of the social continuum in Patagonia
by Magdalena Jensen Castillo and Jessica Parra Nowajewski.

Screening a river, a tiny little portion, a segment in which the water is changing the air beneath the flow. A close up from a 170 kilometers plentiful Baker river in the Aysen Region. This river is in some ways the heart of Aysen. A powerful flux of life in the isolated Patagonia. The people is being repressed by the police forces, but they stay confused about this new turn of events.

These videos were recorded in the city of Coyhaique and at the confluence of the Baker and Neff rivers, in the Chilean Patagonia. Through the period when the Hidroaysen Project (building of several mega dams in Patagonia) was approved by the authorities. It was impressive and sad to see how local people were first awestruck, then angry and sad. How they started to organize to demonstrate and take action against this decision. The Chilean Patagonia is an isolated and tranquil region, so whole families went to the streets to demonstrate their opinion about Hidroaysen, they were violently dispersed by the police, grandparents, and children included. After this first episode, there have been numerous encounters between police and Patagonians.

“... The festival was ending, meanwhile, people from the regional government was giving the green light to the dams, deforestation, aquifer destruction, ocean deprivation, end of a tradition.

In the streets families, children and grandparents were waiting for the decision, they were concerned that the government was ready to approve the project, the interior minister said: “HidroAysen is good for the country” (“Para el país sería bueno que se apruebe HidroAysen”). Despite this, people was still full of hope...”

Full article at voyagers.tumblr.com/post/5404630051/patagonia-aysen-film-...

Most of the people remain in the big cities, most of them just consuming light and water without noticing what it means to have it. Governments are also responsible, poor educational systems, laws underestimating the potential of its lands and patrimony. Corporations just playing with our lives and eating as much they can of us. In some areas, where living is not that easy the sensation of isolation worsens when the capital decide to break the natural encompass of their lives.

It was a dramatic day, after several years of fight against a project, one important decision was taking place. It was not definitive, but in some aspects reflected how the world for them was going to change.
Patagonian people are still fighting, encouraging and managing a new social revolution. They have their own way of life and their traditions are not for sale.

We want to screen a short video running over and over again from Baker River in the section the people call Confluencia (Confluence). In the side videos from demonstrations that began peacefully and became a sad and confusing picture. This images will appear blurred or difficult to see, pixelation as a way of the annihilation of the social continuum.

We want a future, a good one. A Patagonia Without Dams.

Taken on: March 29, 2012

Tags:

patagonia

without

rio

baker

protestas

hidroaysen

mayo

2011

coyhaique

aysen

chile

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