Gather Wood, Gather Words

“Gather Wood, Gather Words” focuses on and then unfolds from the figure and gestures of gathering wood. The Sisyphean labors of country women in rural Morocco or Brazil or India who collect branches for their family cookstoves become a guiding image/movement and point of departure for exploring climate anxiety. The action of gathering branches and the figure of the fagot becomes an invitation to gather together practices, imaginations and disciplinary knowledge in new ways to understand human action and consciousness in the Anthropocene.
Our project asks whether rather than commencing with a concept or hypothesis, focus on a particular movement can develop new relationships among diverse disciplines. We are attentive to the body in motion, to the movements necessary to assemble wood or grain in bundles, texts in archives, or objects in museums. Focusing on gathering and bundling, moving from forest to sown field to factories or office suites, the figure of the fagot becomes an invitation to gather together practices, imaginations and disciplinary knowledge in new ways.

“Gathering” is a motion, but “a gathering” also an assemblage of objects and people. Exploring the interplay of site/gathering/ field/ archive will nourish experiments that encourage participants to try new methods, practices and modes of publication. In summer 2023 we will develop site -specific projects in the UAE, Brazil, Morocco, Europe and the USA. We envision this work leading to collaborations both among NYUAD faculty and students and with local communities. We project the creation of a rhizomatic global network for globally sharing our site-centered work as it advances.

Project Researchers

Surabhi Sharma