Open Invitation - An Exploration of Deep time and conscious Listening Film and Talk

If Deep Time is a frame to understand scales of time that are beyond human experience and history, then rocks are the witness to Deep Time.

The Project

Open Invitation Collective is a group of artists who share similar concerns around ecology, the environment and how we inhabit our planet. After a year-long research process we are excited to share the research process and art works where we explore geological time, ancient landscape, and human presence through conscious listening. The art works that we have created are contemplative, immersive, and experiential. This project has been supported by SONIC MATTER, Switzerland and SWISSNEX, India

Experimental Film

The film visually explores the relationship of the human form to the landscape and pays attention to time, both human and geological. The film evokes a sense of expanse and immersion.

Geological Talk If deep time is a frame to understand scales of time that are beyond human experience and history, then rocks are the witness to deep time. This talk will open up some ideas around our current understanding of deep time as captured by these rocks and a geological approach to reading the landscape around us.

The People

Shabari Rao (lead research artist) is an artist and educator whose work is grounded in practice based research. Her primary interest is in the question: what counts as knowledge and how is the body involved in creating it?

Bindhumalini Narayanswamy (collaborating artist) is a singer and composer interested in exploring and expressing the soul stirring power of music and silence.

Manush John (collaborating artist) is an artist and filmmaker who is interested in critically looking at human systems and knowledge creation in the context of impending environmental catastrophe.

Navya Sah (collaborating artist) is an Indian multidisciplinary artist who works in the realms of sound, film, movement and writing. Her work studies emotional responses on the politics of power and love. She likes the quiet.

When Thejaswi Shvanand (collaborating geologist) began reading in childhood, the Indian tectonic plate was farther away from the Eurasian plate by 66 cm. He likes to track the consequences of this plate movement during annual hikes in the Himalayas while continuing to read and work as a curator and library educator at Champaca Bookstore and Children's Library.