Complexities of Water

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[Editor note: The following notes were made by @albertorey during the “Complexities of Water”, of OpenVillage Festival (19th October 2017). Quotes are not verbatim but summarize what was said. If you feel something is mis-represented, please tell us in a comment or with the “Flag → Something Else” feature and a mod will fix it. – @anu]

@Alberto Ray

Start at the beginning and how my work as an artist has evolved and how the metaphor started to incorporate science then how it got into community work as well.

There are some books for the people to have a look.

I was born in Cuba and asylum to Mexico then to Miami then 15 years moving around the north east , I relocated 20 times, lack of home made a huge difference for me, my art work became more layered , then started to think about the idea of landscape with relation to culture, how culture is formed from the landscape.

Artwork is presented

While I was working on these black and white images from cuba,
So in USA, the artist go out in the wilderness and bring this large artwork, and people can experience art and science thought these paintings.
I started to make these painting to the fish species and document the bodies of water that the people walk by everyday to make this connection to the audience, to connect their experiences.
As I started too, if you understand your regional waters then you will understand your global waters, so I moved to document that.

Connect the global and regional issues, if you understand what’s happening in your hometown you will understand what happens in the global scene.

This connect the traditional way of doing art to the contemporary work, I started to extend my knowledge and started to do books and video like the book about Nepal written in Eng and hindi so it is accessible.

The idea to use the painting with sound and video and project them very large to the audience to connect to their landscape
Invited to several venues around the country,

Examples of different exhibitions

One, making test and investigating the water and discover how polluted it is even though people live naturally with it and near it.
One sample was very high on e coli even though it is in a part that is supposed to be relatively cleaner than the nearby places.

Kathmandu, has this river , the holiest river and the most polluted, I wondered how a river that is so important become so polluted, made a research and the it is very complicated, the cultural importance of water is very deep people use it bathe in it and then some how it became very polluted.

Took 5 venues, and made a report from water experts , and used them for the book and exhibition, ……and came to a point it is being danger just to be exposed and step in the water, students collected samples made some designs.

Interviewed a lot of people for the documentary, talking about the water and how it became a cultural practice. How it became important in the buddhist culture to wash the bodies of the deceased to wash their bodies in the water and then release them, then water became very polluted, and this stopped, but this was really important for the culture.

On development of Kathmandu and how it grew from the the 60s till now, there is not enough sewage control, so every stream that feeds in the river is polluted, by the time it leaves the valley the water is black from sewage and industrial waste,
Now they have gotten grants to build water treatment units, some were build some were not due to corruption.
The hope at this point to clean the water but diluting the water till they get enough water treatment plants.

This was the art side, now the community side.
The fly fishing program We meet every week and reflect on how many insects that live in the stream.
Besides fly fishing we talk about the value of water how to evaluate how clean the water is, and we up the stream collect the bugs, and the no of bugs tells us how clean is the water.

Program started 18 years ago. Lots of underprivileged people ?in the inner city
A lot of students went to environmental sciences, these individuals to become stewards of the environment.
We provide mentors for the kids and provide a positive role model, that we found that to be very important in these communities

We realized that there are needs in other communities, it was clear we couldn’t go for all these communities to do the same, then we started to work with adults, community leaders, teachers, etc so we started a conference and we provide all the equipment and the materials with 50 % discount from the industry for them to start their own program.
We host also a steam cleaner, not only clean but plant trees they allows more bugs to survive.
We have done 5 conferences already , in the mornings in the classroom and in the afternoon we go to fly fish, and see it as an activity to bring students outside.

After this we are going to work with communities in new mexico.

Now working on extinct birds art work collection. As we are facing mass extinction nowadays.

Last thing that flyfishing does,
We started to re introduce this fish species, they are very sensitive to water quality, we fundraised and worked with the youth and adults and we are now fro 7?
Years introducing this bruter?
Fish to local waters.

The fish started to migrate to other streams as well. This was very successful and we are continuing with the program and trying to expand it.

@winnie

How you approach the same thing in Nepal?

@Alberto Ray

When we started the program, was very small, had 4 students took years and sometimes we couldn’t find a place to have it, this made us seem unpro, then we found a place that can host us every week, then it started, this consistency is important.
We used not to make in the summer, then now we do it all year round.
We have kids that r 10 years old and mentors that are 80 years old

In Nepal , we spend a lot of time to work with water experts and find info that are not mentioned in the documents, the main issue with kathmandu is for the generation , the youngest generation has no memory of the river being clean, they have the idea of it is always dirty and will always be this way. And if the old generation didn’t work on reclaiming their old vision there is a sense of hopelessness as the young was accepting the situation.

We were there to make a difference, and participation level was different, there are a lot of things that are needed to be done. It could happen.

Often it takes one person to market that difference, you can start and ask for the assistance, but you need somebody to organize and help and raise the funds, and you will find a lot of interested people who don’t want to be leading but they want to be there and help with what they can,

Then you gotta have fun doing it. As most of this is volunteering.

@Islam

For kathmandu what are the steps need to recover it if you will stay for longer?

@Alberto Ray

There has to be political incentive to do it, there are a lot of non govt. organization who do what they can, but when the money goes to the government, it stops there, so if anyone wants things to be done they give money to these ngos.
There were a group of women who were collecting water and got introduced to clean the water using ceramic filters and others techniques these was done by these NGOS.

A lot of other problem with the groundwater, so there is also lack of water,

Its a problem that is there for a long time, now there is a pressure to do something as even some people can have their political positions in stack.

Acoli alone is not harmful but the mix and other wastes together ( note form the biologist from the audience )

@Alberto Ray

Funding for the flyfishing
It is kinda a long story I was going in a flight sat next to a guy we got to talk, and then by the end so what do u do, I work in an organization that gives funding for groups who work with kids,… Not too much, but enough to do stream cleanups, and make some sponsors for the cleanups and what’s left we put in the flyfishing and get donations and equipments for free. After having a consistency it’s easy to get free equipments , even more than what we need, we even give them to other groups

@Sohyeb

(The most exciting discovery)
It was probably couple month ago when we found out that there are bructa (the fish species ) down other streams, which was not expected to survive. The idea of this and the kids to realize this they handle life fish to put in water.

(Saddest discovery)
The bagmati (Kathmandu river) we try to do what we can , but just seeing the level of corruption and you like to be hopeful but you don’t know. There is hope they make every saturday they have clean ups this never stops even after the earthquake,
The water is still toxic but when they finish, you can’t find a piece of paper by the banks.

Was working with fishermen, and they want clean water but they do affect the water?

Just a comment as the people don’t know how was the river being clean, we are also for example don’t know how was it before money .

@noemi

What’s your expectations from this place, the people here, the festival?

@Alberto Ray

My program started from a discussion for 2 hours with another person , I wanted to do something for the kids in my community.
To figure out the nuts and bolts, then you have a community of helpers and get started.

What is the cultural significance of bodies of water? Understand regional and global issues.