Green Academy E7 — Thinking like a Beaver: An Artistic Guide to Mountain Forests — with Anna Siekierska, Poland
Thursday, 22 May 2025, 18:00 hours CET, via Zoom
Event hosted and prepared by me for Sustainable Europe Research Institute Germany, in collaboration with Pro Progressione, Hungary
Description
What connects the mountains with the lowlands? Rivers. Their tangle is like a circulatory and excretory system. It nourishes what is barren, irrigates what has dried up, flushes out accumulated deposits, dissolves pollutants, dilutes fertiliser and sewage concentrates. At the same time, the state of water reflects how people treat the land.
This includes old mountain forests that act as sponges soaking up even heavy rainfalls. One devastating consequence of damaged forests are river floods such as the ones in Bircza village (2023) and the Kłodzko Valley (2024), both located at the foot of mountain ranges along Poland’s southern border. Where the residents need a sponge, there is only a sieve.
In response, Warsaw-based artist Anna Siekierska recently set out to create a guide to maintaining and restoring mountain forests that balance the water system. An advocate of cooperation and the sharing of knowledge and skills, she invited both forest activists and local residents to contribute their field expertise. Anna also draws knowledge from careful observation of the environment. In particular, she tries to learn from beavers – the best engineers in the field of water retention. Combining country lore, activism, ecological education, and technical instructions for restoring water retention, the guide encourages people to get to know mountain forests, peat bogs, and beavers.
Anna will introduce us to her book project and its process of co-creation, including a number of field trips told and illustrated in its pages. We will discuss her role as an artist-activist, how the guide relates to her other work, and why she loves sheep.
About the speaker
Anna Siekierska is a sculptor and cyclist, a faculty member at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, and an activist for the protection of old forests. She has co-authored numerous installations in public space, socially engaged projects, and activities that raise awareness of the lives of other beings, centred around the complex network of relationships between people and the more-than-human world. She has shown her works in the most important art institutions in Poland and in many places abroad (Czech Republic, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Republic of Kosovo, Romania, Ukraine). Anna spends a lot of time in various thickets and swamps. She likes swimming, hiking, gardening, and seasonally eating tomatoes.
Anna’s website: annasiekierska.tumblr.com
