Genre Fluid — All Issues — Underwater New York

Paper Trail

Paper Trail is a mixed-reality experimental climate change fiction project. Inspired by climate change research and sea-level projections, the tour depicts New York City in different future eras as it grapples with rising sea levels—unless we do something more to combat climate change today.

Paper Trail was developed by A.E. Souzis during her WoW/UNY residency in 2019 and was inspired by (and features) drawings of possible NYC futures made by Governors Island visitors during her 2018 WoW/UNY residency with /rive art collective.

Timelines Through a Fish Eye Lens: Fish Quilt

I have centuries of data on the history of fish species and the fisheries in New York City waters. I’ve been researching this industry for years and the stories embedded in the data are many, complex, and show patterns of use and abuse, loss and resilience. It’s an overwhelming amount of information that I’ve shared in bits and pieces, but I’ve never released it all to the public. A book seems daunting, an academic paper isn’t enough and doesn’t reach most of the people in New York City that I would like to. As a dancer, I also wanted to make it physical, tangible, spatial, and interactive.

Issue 16: Governors Island Un-EarthedCarolyn HallApril 6, 2020Issue 16, Genre Fluid, Art

Imaginary Map: New York Harbor

Over two seasons in residence on Governors Island, I worked to expand a body of work called TRACES. Rivers are constantly changing course, redistributing energy and carving new paths. Dance pathways are also not fixed, with variations every time movement is performed. This series of choreographic works uses stream dynamics and river morphology as a point of departure that, when performed, create large drawings as an artifact of the dance, mapping the unique signature of each performance and, abstractly, the water body that inspired it.

Buttermilk Beach Access Plan

Buttermilk Beach Access Plan is a series of two rope ladders designed to be installed along the Governors Island promenade to provide access to Buttermilk Beach during low tide. As described in the Waterfront Alliance Maritime Activation Plan for Governors Island, tidal timing allows Buttermilk Beach, on the east side of the island facing Brooklyn and Buttermilk Channel, to accommodate at least three hours of on-beach public programming per-day for ten out of every fourteen days. Currently, there are no formal public access points allowing visitors to touch the water along the Governors Island coastline, and there is a six-foot drop from the promenade down to Buttermilk Beach.

Issue 16: Governors Island Un-EarthedCody HerrmannApril 6, 2020Issue 16, Genre Fluid

Water in the Desert 122° F

Water in the Desert 122°F is a meditation on the past and future of the miles of canals that thread through Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona. The largest pre-Columbian irrigation system in North America, the canals were first engineered 2000 years ago by the ancestral Sonoran Desert people. This Native history was destroyed by the construction of the settler-colonial metropolis. This urban space of asphalt and concrete is ill-prepared for the heat that is coming. The summer now reaches 122°F. At 130°, what happens to the city’s vulnerable people, plants, and animals? Adaptation or abandonment?

the channel grounds (opal)

This work was created during the WoW/UNY Governors Island Residency. Simone Johnson was in residence on Governors Island from August 6-September 2, 2018.

Issue 12: Governors IslandSimone JohnsonOctober 7, 2019Governors Island, Genre Fluid

Traces

This work was created during the WoW/UNY Governors Island Residency. David Andree was in residence on Governors Island from June 25-July 8, 2018.

Issue 12: Governors IslandChristina CataneseOctober 7, 2019Governors Island, Genre Fluid

Scrap Dive

Editors' note: Scrap Dive is an exhibit created by graduate student Margaret C. Argiro for "The Social Hall: An Oral History Exhibit" at Columbia University on May 1, 2014. For Scrap Dive, Margaret drew on oral history interviews conducted with Ed Fanuzzi from October 2013 - March 2014, as well as photos and objects from his personal collection. This post is a digitized version of the exhibit.

Issue 4: ShipwreckedMaggie C. Argiro with Ed FanuzziSeptember 29, 2019Lower New York Bay, Genre Fluid

Underwater New York is a platform for writing, art, and music inspired by the waterways of New York City.