MIKHAIL KARIKISSomos o Tempo

Somos o Tempo [We are the weather] is Mikhail Karikis’s first presentation in Porto and brings together a new body of work that reflects on the climate emergency. In three works the artist explores listening as a force of care, solidarity, and activism, and proposes sound-making as a socio-political action that helps us cultivate common visions, tune into the sonorities of climate change, and celebrate our entanglement with the world. 

Surging Seas comprises a display of placards with archival images of environmental protests in Portugal, posters, calls to action and near-future flood maps. Sourced from climate modelling websites, images on the placards show the extent of flooding and land-loss the coastal area near Porto will suffer in a +2C global temperature rise scenario. A video presents a transcript of an imagined conversation between two young people in 2080. They ask what brings humans together and reflect on the instinct to sustain and love all life, and our responsibility toward future generations. This conversation was developed in collaboration with 20-year-old students from Birmingham School of Art using instructional music scores by the queer musicologist and composer Pauline Oliveros. 

The Weather Orchestra is a sound and video installation that is an ode to the elements, expressing our deep relationship and entanglement with the weather and celebrating our connection to the atmosphere and the earth. In this installation Sismógrafo space transforms into an indoor weather system generated through sound vibration and singing. A projection feature musicians performing on instruments and analogue noise machines designed to imitate the sounds of natural phenomena. A Baroque wind machine, three Latin American ceremonial rain sticks, an ocean drum, a water-phone, a thunder tube, and metallic thunder sheets fill the space with meteorological music and allude to the forces and magnificence of nature. In the middle of this soundscape and swept up by the noise, an LCD monitor shows singers from Syria, Denmark, Madeira and mainland Portugal bursting in folk songs and calls expressing joy, respect, fear and wonder toward the elements surrounding us. 

Collectively, the works rejoice the transformative power of listening and sound-making while declaring that we are the weather and the time is now for us to change the course of climate change.

Mikhail Karikis (Thessaloniki, GR, 1975) lives between London and Lisbon. His work in the fields of moving image, sound, performance, and other media has been shown in the contemporary art biennials, museums and film festivals. Selected, in 2019 and 2016, to the Film London Jarman Award, UK, Karikis exhibits internationally, including: Lisboa Soa, PT (2022); 2nd Riga Biennial, LV (2020); Kochi-Muziris Biennale, IN (2016); British Art Show 8, UK (2015-2017); Steirischer Herbst, AT (2015); 5th Thessaloniki Biennale, GR (2015); 19th Biennale of Sydney, AU (2014); Mediacity Seoul/SeMA Biennale, Seoul, KR (2014); Videonale 14, Kunstmuseum Bonn, DE (2013); 2nd Aichi Triennale, JP (2013); Manifesta 9, BE (2012); Danish Pavilion, 54th Venice Biennale, IT (2011). His solo exhibitions have been presented at Carpintarias de São Lázaro, PT (2022); Tate Liverpool, UK (2020); Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, IT (2019); Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, UK (2019-2020); De la Warr Pavilion, UK (2019-2020); MORI Art Museum, Tokyo, JP (2019); Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK (2018-2019) and Turku Art Museum, FI (2018) among others. Karikis has released three solo music albums, performs as a musician and is runs the PhD programme at MIMA School of the Arts and Creative Industries.

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