Dylan Mooney is included in Biennale of Sydney: rīvus.
Rivers, wetlands and other salt and freshwater ecosystems feature in the 23rd Biennale of Sydney (2022), titled rīvus, as dynamic living systems with varying degrees of political agency. Indigenous knowledges have long understood non-human entities as living ancestral beings with a right to life that must be protected. But only recently have animals, plants, mountains and bodies of water been granted legal personhood. If we can recognise them as individual beings, what might they say?
rīvus invites several aqueous beings into a dialogue with artists, architects, designers, scientists, and communities, entangling multiple voices and other modes of communication to ask unlikely questions: Can a river sue us over psychoactive sewage? Will oysters grow teeth in aquatic revenge? What do the eels think? Are the swamp oracles speaking in tongues? Do algae reminisce about the days of primordial soup? Are waves the ocean’s desire? Can a waterfall refuse gravity? Considering the water ecology’s perspective entails a fundamental shift in understanding our relationship with the rest of the natural world as a porous chronicle of interwoven fates.
Dylan Mooney's work explores Torres Strait Islanders' rich and enduring cultures and languages that are inextricably linked to the place they call ‘home’. More than just a physical structure, an interconnectedness between people, place and knowledge is their foundation of identity. Now with the threat of rising sea levels, how do Torres Strait Islanders maintain their strong sense of identity and place if home is underwater?
