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This year the word is 'Earth’ and features original works by Filippo Andreatta, Jessica Marion Barr, Christina Battle, Sepideh Behrouzian, Joshua Bonnetta, Andrew Denton, Tanya Doody, Ufuk Ali Gueray, Michaela Grill / Karl Lemieux, Jessica Karuhanga, Masha Kouznetsova, Ella Dawn McGeough, Erica Mendritzki, Sarah Messerschmidt, Joseph Naytowhow, Cassie Packham, Parsons & Charlesworth, Danielle Petti, Laura St. Pierre, Dawit L. Petros, Jackson 2bears, Arielle Walker, Aurora Wolfe, Worried Earth, Melanie Zurba, and more.

The word ‘earth’ when preceded by a direct article becomes planetary, the Earth. This proximity shifts our understanding of ‘the substance of the land surface; soil’ into ‘the world’. It moves from ground under your feet and soil you can hold in your hand, to expanse you walk on and territory you live within. This perceptual transformation makes clear the potency of spatial relationality in language and worldmaking and opens the parallel in this year’s title and prompt, Earth (Okâwîmâw Askiy - ᐅᑳᐧᒫᐊᐧᐢᑭᕀ).

The planet Earth is the only one in this solar system whose English name is not taken from Greek or Roman mythology. The word Earth comes from Old English and simply means ground. Ground-, grounded, defined as the solid surface of the earth, a limited or defined extent of the earth's surface; land, land of a specified kind, an area of knowledge or subject of discussion or thought, factors forming a basis for action or the justification for a belief, a prepared surface, solid particles that form a residue; sediment.

While the planets that exist light years away are assigned narratives already in existence, it is Earth’s spatial and relational proximity to us, that invites beings to story it directly with experiences born of connections between living and place. Humans continue to re-story the world as Earth’s topography informs us while we simultaneously inform, deform and re-form.

One story goes that when Earth was a young planet, a large chunk of rock smashed into it, displacing a portion of Earth's interior. The resulting chunks clumped together and formed our Moon. Unlike other discrete moons in this solar system, Earth and Moon were once one. Moon is made of Earth, and Earth, like its human inhabitants, is mostly made up of water. These critical correspondences and seeming oppositions of liquids that produce the appearance of solids make clear the intra-relations at play, the co-constitutive nature of things, and how our wounded planet maintains balance through its spatial tether to its long-lost entrails.

We understand well that a single narrative is inadequate. There has never been just one, there have always been many. There are indeed other stories, but they are not our own to tell.

How do we definitively describe something still coming into being? How do we definitively describe something that is brought into being by multitudes, and regardless of consensus of origin, fully exists?

What becomes clear through the stories is the relationship between the earth and the moon is one of deep entanglement, they are made from each other and continue to rely on each other in reciprocal ways. These co-constitutions, interreliance, and fluidity of meaning reflect how Earth is primarily made up of water—its seeming material opposite—and the ground itself is made up of a series of relations. Western science describes it as the only planet in this solar system to support life as ‘we’ know it (knowing Western understanding of life is limited). In this cosmology, Earth is an ocean planet reliant on its moon to keep it from wobbling uncontrollability.

There is an intimacy implied and required in making our world a whole constructed of millions of parts, distributed and connected, reliant on their ongoing transmission and reception. Electronic communications require grounding to flow uninterrupted and make clear our species’ reliance on Earth to both imagine and articulate connections and the potential to be whole, if wounded, through them. Amplifying Earth as a series of relations becomes our grounding premise.

Samuel Beckett concludes one of his Fizzles with these words “ruinstrewn land, little panic steps.” As both unsettled settlers of Argentinian/Austrian and Scottish/Dutch heritage, the paths we take are teeming with these little panic steps, but they are steps nonetheless.

We are coming towards you from this ground here. Here, kisiskâciwan, the traditional territories of the Nehiyawak, Maškékowak, Nîhithaw, Lakota, Nakoda, Dakota, Saulteaux (Anihšināpē), Dene, and the ancestral lands of the Métis, specifically Treaty 6 on the Canadian Prairies.

Lineup:

• Earth - Hour 1 (18:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Aurora Wolfe & Joseph Naytowhow.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 1st hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 2 (19:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Parsons & Charlesworth, Dawit L. Petros, Michaela Grill & Karl Lemieux.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 2nd hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 3 (20:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Michaela Grill & Karl Lemieux.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 3rd hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 4 (21:00 GMT)

The Centre for Sustainable Curating presents Christina Battle and Jessica Karuhanga**.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 4th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth -Hour 5 (22:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Jessica Marion Barr, Ufuk Ali Gueray, Ella Dawn McGeough, Erica Mendritzki, and Melanie Zurba.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 5th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 6 (23:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Joshua Bonnetta.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 6th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 7 (00:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Car Martin, coyote and Alexis Kinloch.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 7th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 8 (01:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Office for a Human Theatre.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 8th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 9 (02:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present ** Sepideh Behrouzian**.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 9th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 10 (03:00 GMT)

Otekhnòtshera Ratirihwisaks Etho:onhwentsyáke (OTEKH) presents Tanya Doody & Jackson 2bears, Cassie Packham.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 10th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 11 (04:00 GMT)

Otekhnòtshera Ratirihwisaks Etho:onhwentsyáke (OTEKH) presents Masha Kouznetsova and Danielle Petti.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 11th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

• Earth - Hour 12 (05:00 GMT)

University of Saskatchewan Art Galleries and Collection present Andrew Denton.

The last twenty-five minutes of the 12th hour feature the contribution of Laura St. Pierre.

Full programme

Project Page

The sixth in Christof Migone's series of twelve annual 12-hour events taking place on December 12th from 5pm to 5am the next day. Each year the event moves through each word of the phrase ‘You and I Are Water Earth Fire Air of Life and Death’ and a group of international artists activate the word of the year in myriad ways. Streamed live on YouTube.