Uprooted and boarded on a ferry, a tree floats on the open sea. Is this an avant-garde performance or a research experiment? Turns out, it’s neither: this and other centenarian trees have been scouted, uprooted and moved about the country. They wave farewell to their birthplace as they head towards the private arboretum of an oligarch in Salome Jashi’s meditative contemplation on nature, power and desire, Taming the Garden. The path of these trees raises the question, what happens when natural habitats are transformed following the will and the whim of the powerful? What happens when the scale of human intervention becomes truly global, affecting the lives of millions across continents? Who owns the clouds, wind and air? Should there be limits to human control over nature? What responsibilities come with this? The films in this section pose many questions we might not be ready to face head-on.
Anthropocene