ECOLE MONDIALE: FIELDSTATION ABC...

My investigation aims to rethink – reconsider – redirect and re-evaluate the gathering and assembling at stake in zoological collections, the archive of fauna & flora and by extension cultural heritage1. The observation of these collections – archives – heritage considered as a repository will offer the starting point for questioning, investigating and exploring appropriate forms and contemporary interpretations of the gathering and assembling that are related to these ‘public repositories’. This investigation and exploration of forms and interpretations will imply also a reconsideration of the cross-fertilization between education and leisure, that both are commonly associated with these kinds of repositories. I will investigate how to develop and create productive forms i.e. modes of gathering and assembling that affect our relation with and the perception of nature – environment – history. This investigation of forms and interpretations is directly related to my own social-artistic practice. Following questions will be part of my investigation: how to open up information and how to make it accessible for the public, for future generations such that it goes beyond simple information and can be also ‘formation’ i.e. bringing our relation to nature actually into play? How to create a level of participation and to reconsider what is the dimension of participation of the public in my artistic practice? The zoo / collection/archive can be conceived in many different ways regarded from different angles such as the historical, social, cultural, geo-political context. How to engage the public to interpret and use the zoo / collection/archive to situate and locate the heritance in a contemporary context?

In summary and stated generally, I want to investigate, related to my social-artistic practice: what could be appropriate, contemporary forms of the gathering and assembling that constitute zoo’s and archives as spaces and places where our relation with ‘nature’ is at stake? Such spaces can be conceived as laboratories where experiments find place (i.e. putting our relation to nature to the test) and therefore my investigation can also be seen as an investigation into appropriate laboratory forms of zoological collections and archives.

The focus on my analysis will be on the gathering and assembling of the Barcelona Zoological garden and specifically on the case of Copito de Nieve (Spanish for Snowflake). By focussing on the case study of Copito de Nieve my aim is to re-interpret this case as a broader part of the zoological collection and its heritage into a contemporary context.2

Is the Copito de Nieve case an a-typical case or is it a confirmation of the typical species in a zoological collection?

Analysis of the assembling of the Jordi Sabater Pi collection at the University Barcelona and how this relates to the zoological & botanical gardens of Barcelona.

How to develop an ongoing – long-term platform in Rio Muni - Equatorial Guinea opposite the Copito de Nieve case in the Barcelona Zoo?

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What can be an appropriate form for the development of a platform in Rio Muni - Equatorial Guinea reconsidering the Copito de Nieve case in the Barcelona Zoo?

1 I use the term cultural heritage here as a direct link to the topic of the zoo. (i.e. the infrastructure and architecture of historical enclosures)

2 for a detailled description of the history of Copito de Nieve I attach Filip Van Dingenen. Flota Nfumu: Rethinking Art, Archives and Pedagogy in the case of Copito de Nieve. In Afro-Hispanic Review. Monographic Issue on Equatorial Guinea edited by Benita Sampedro Vizcaya and Baltasar Fra-Molinero. Issue 28. Nr.2 Fall 2009.