"Solastalgia" describes the loss that land-dependent communities feel when their place is violated. They command the Wellcome Collection in June
Some land-based voices from the Land Body Ecologies project
It’s a word new to us, and it immediately seems useful: Solastalgia is “the mental distress specifically caused by environmental change, where one’s home environment and sense of place is being violated”. The Wellcome Collection explains further:
Environmental Philosopher Glenn Albrecht created the term solastalgia in 2005, based on the emotional impacts of large scale coal mining on individuals’ wellbeing in New South Wales, Australia, where he is based. In 2015, the term was included in the medical journal The Lancet as a contributing concept to the impact of Climate Change on Human Health and Wellbeing. More recently, the term solastalgia was also published in the United Nations’ 2022 report by the IPCC – Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
In Albrecht's publication Earth Emotions (2019), solastalgia is identified as one of six conditions he defines as land-based sicknesses, or psychoterratic diseases, emerging from our changing relationship to our natural world. Unlike the more commonly recognised term eco-anxiety, which relates to the sense of global dread and lack of control over the current and predicted future state of human-induced climate change, solastalgia is rooted in a lived experience of place, and bound within how one defines their home, their land and identity.
A forthcoming event at the Wellcome Institute dedicates four days (22nd to 25th of June) to exploring solastalgia, in the hands of The Land Body Ecologies research group They are artists and ecologists, but also made up from representatives of the following “land-dependent or indigenous groups”:
Ogiek in Kenya, Batwa in Uganda, Pgak’yau (Karen) in Northern Thailand, Sámi across the wider Arctic region, as well as communities living in the buffer zones of the Bannerghatta National Park in India, and communities affected by the damming of rivers in Northern Finland.
They’ve been part of the Wellcome Hub, on the fifth floor of the London building, for the past two years. The aim of the project is to:
Understand how the mental health of marginalised communities is affected by changes in their ecosystems
Explore the definition of Solastalgia as it currently stands and whether it encompasses the lived experiences of marginalised, land-dependent communities.
Understand the role that historical and contemporary violences faced by these communities plays in their lived experience of Solastalgia.
The sharing and demonstration of artistic technique from each of these communities, making manifest the sense of solastalgic loss, is the most immediately attractive part of this show. For example:
Artist collective Invisible Flock with master potter Allahjurriro and Faqir Zulfiqar, the only known artist to play the borindo, presents ‘Microtonal.’ This interactive sound installation and sculpture comprises over two hundred borindos, which are ancient hand thrown pots. Microtonal is an off-site installation at The Crypt Gallery, capturing sounds and recreating them in soothing soundscapes. It won the Karachi Biennale Jury Prize in 2022 and is presented in the UK for the first time. Zulfiqar will perform with the borindo alongside a Q&A with artist Ben Eaton.
Sámi artists Outi Pieski and Jenni Laiti present ‘Ovdavázzit - Forewalkers’ an ancient and futuristic portal and path of thirty freestanding body-height Sámi walking sticks at the main entrance to Wellcome Collection. The artwork is about indigenous knowledge, ancestral technology, traditional crafts, and sovereignty. The work signals how life and mobility are based on a sustainable co-existence with the needs of the land.
Elder Noosokon Nadunguenkop in traditional Ogiek regalia for the welcoming ceremony in Nkareta
Communal activities and workshops provide conversation spaces for uncovering histories through traditional Batwa and Ogiek storytelling, and weaving, food knowledge and cooking. Members of the Pgak’yau (Karen) in Northern Thailand host workshops on making traditional snacks like Meitau, recreating a Thai coffee ceremony, and preparing a meal together while sharing the seven stages of the Pgak’yau rotational farming practices.
There’s a wide set of talks, films and other installations at the event, in and around the Wellcome Collection in London, from 22nd to 25th of June 2023- tickets and bookings available here. More on the definition of solastalgia here.