In Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents, A Tale of A Tub presents three solo exhibitions of artists who, in different ways, research the phenomena of deep sea mining, coastal ecology and underwater cable networks. The artists involved connect different voices and perspectives together to generate awareness on how extraction through deep-sea mining and the construction of cable infrastructures depletes and pollutes the soils of seas and oceans, and contributes to loss of biodiversity in underwater and coastal ecosystems.

A Tale of A Tub has invited the Embassy of the North Sea to assemble a complementary public program in relation to Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents. During this event on June 26 at A Tale of A Tub, sound artist and composer Harpo ’t Hart will introduce the Embassy of the North Sea. He will continue to zoom in on their research concerning underwater noise in the North Sea. Landscape architect Thijs de Zeeuw will be presenting his investigation into new forms of underwater infrastructures from an ecological perspective, with an emphasis on how we can think about and construct new forms of cohabitation with other species and their environment. 
Harpo t'Hart and Thijs de Zeeuw will enter a conversation with two of the artists partaking in Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents; Sami Hammana and Elisa Strinna. Sami Hammana draws parallels between the Dutch colonial past and current financial practices that are spreading globally through undersea cable networks. The hypothesis of his research project is simple: there is no functional difference between the colonial practices of the Dutch East India Company fleet and the contemporary speculative market economy that is propagated across the globe via submarine cables. In an ongoing investigation into the increasing interdependence of technological and geological landscapes, material and virtual realities, and natural and artificial worlds, Elisa Strinna presents her recent work on transatlantic cable networks that support a global system of information transmission.

PART OF THE EXHIBITION

29.05.2021—08.08.2021
Trade Winds in the Age of Underwater Currents
SAMI HAMMANA
KRISTINA ÕLLEK
ELISA STRINNA