Sediments

2023, short-film, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

Images of disfigured landscapes, extinct villages, stories of survival and interviews with communities affected by coal mining, intertwine to rebuild an awareness of what we are losing.

Our species has transformed from a simple biological agent to a geological force, as described in the article “The Climate of History” by Dipesh Chakrabarty (2009). This is one of the reasons why the scientific community has defined the current geological epoch as the "Anthropocene", in which human beings with their activities have modified territorial and climatic structures, impacting on geological processes (Crutzen 2000). Some researchers make the beginning of the Anthropocene coincide with the beginning of the industrialization of the massive exploitation of fossil fuels, the birth of synthetic products and the extinctions of species (Lovelock 2019). The energy resource that has contributed to the development of humanity to date has become the main cause of the climate crisis. Hitting the weakest, ethnic minorities and the poorest classes.

The project

The documentary deals with the complexity of the theme through a poetic and anthropological approach. Making visible through storytelling and memories of what is disappearing and what has disappeared. A way to know and map what is left in the memory of a community that has lost its place of origin. The shooting is concentrated in Europe, trying to bring out the contrast and the points of view in ethically and technologically developed places with problematic and complex circumstances. Everything will be filmed in the heart of Europe between the clandestine mines of former miners in Silesia (Poland) and the largest coal mine in Europe in the North Rhine-Westphalia region (Germany).