Convening: Reservoirs for Water Futures

The Reservoirs for Water Futures convening asks: What will life in our desert look like in one hundred years? How will our descendants be thinking about and using water?

This series of presentations, followed by a roundtable discussion, brings together artist-scholars and creative researchers working across methodologies and materialities, both collaboratively and individually, on questions about the water and waterways in their metaphorical, material, and temporal dimensions.

Reshaped by a panoply of human interventions conducted in service of political, economic, and cultural expansionism, water and waterways have also inspired scholars, scientists and other researchers to reflect and reimagine fundamental imbrications of terrestrial-aquatic ecological systems ranging from the deep past, the present and into its projected futures. Alternative archaeologies, deep mapping, and counter-cartographies trace presence, absence, and the movement of water—whether tidal, fluvial, riparian, or subterranean. Panelists include artists Heather Green, Tali Keren, and Emiddio Vasquez and archaeologist Aaron Wright. Discussion will be moderated by art historians Chelsea Haines and Meredith Hoy.

This event is organized in partnership with Chelsea Haines, Assistant Professor, Art History & Museum Studies, ASU, and Tali Keren, artist-in-residence at the Global Futures Water Institute, ASU. It is supported by the Leonardo-ASU Planetary Health Research Seed Grant.

Reservoirs for Water Futures is a two day convening held at Arizona State University Friday, October 24 and MOCA Tucson Sunday, October 26. More information about the event at ASU on Friday October 24 here. RSVP for the event at MOCA Tucson on Sunday, October 26 here.

In-kind support provided by Open Water.
Image Caption: Tali Karen, Delta/Desal: A Border Ecology, 2024, video still. Image courtesy the artist.