Trouble is an interesting word. It derives from a thirteenth-century French verb meaning “to stir up,” “to make cloudy,” “to disturb.” We – all of us on Terra – live in disturbing times, mixed-up times, troubling and turbid times. The task is to become capable, with each other in all of our bumptious kinds, of response.
Donna Haraway, Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucine, 2016
Photomontage depicting Antonia in an urban landscape with no more Homo sapiens. © Jane Michaele Cameron
Meet Antonia
She is an ant from the future, latin name Gigantiops oculus tertius. She is the size of a rat. Her exoskeleton has large pores to help her ingest larger amounts of Oxygen. Towards the back of her head is a third eye.
A short film about life after humans are gone.
ANThropocene: embracing trouble
Single channel stop-motion animation, 2020
This is a snapshot of time in the distant future. The climate has stabilised and cooled and there is less Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This has led to some evolutionary adaptations. The ant of the future is much larger due to increased levels of oxygen. Although humans are gone, remnants of plastic remain and artificial intelligence has survived.
The time we are living through now, the Anthropocene, is named as a human-centred time characterised by increasing alienation from nature in the West. Ants have existed roughly in their present form for around 100 million years but Homo sapiens has only been around for approximately 300,000 years. Of that, the Anthropocene only covers around the past 11,000 years. Could contemplating this speculative scenario that leaves humans out stir renewed responsibility for the present?
Watch it here (4 minutes)
The making of Anthropocene: embracing trouble
Antonia's view
A test shot of Antonia in the grass in my back yard.
Something fell ...
This is delicious! But too big not to share with you ...
An abandoned nuclear power plant in the valley of the Blue Mountains
Broken down radars on a high ridge in the Blue Mountains
Working on the scientific diagram of the post-human ant in an entomology lab class with students at UNSW BEES (University of New South Wales, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences)
Presenting my work in progress, 'ANThropocene: embracing trouble' to students at UNSW BEES (University of New South Wales, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences)
Chatting with entomology students during my lab talk at UNSW BEES (University of New South Wales, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences)
This post-human ant, Oculus tertius giganticus, is the size of a rat with enlarged pores to suck up all the extra Oxygen in the atmosphere. She has also developed a third eye.