¿De qué pueden hablar los náufragos, sino del mar?
”¿De qué pueden hablar los náufragos, sino del mar?", 2025 video installation, cables and sandbags
¿De qué pueden hablar los náufragos, sino del mar? 2024
¿De qué pueden hablar los náufragos, sino del mar? is a video installation that explores environmental instability, displacement, and the psychological condition of survival through repetition, language, and spatial tension. The installation is composed of two opposing monitors positioned within a circular arrangement of sandbags commonly used for flood containment, transforming the exhibition space into a fragile zone suspended between protection and catastrophe.
On both screens, the looping GIF Learn to Swim endlessly repeats the phrase “LEARN TO SWIM” in split-flap lettering reminiscent of old airport and train station information boards. The mechanical rhythm of the text generates a hypnotic and anxious visual pulse, oscillating between instruction, warning, adaptation, and survival. Language becomes both communication system and environmental alarm.
The title of the installation references the condition of the castaway as a metaphor for contemporary existence within increasingly unstable environmental, emotional, and political landscapes. Here, the sea appears not only as a physical territory but also as a psychological and symbolic space associated with uncertainty, memory, migration, and disappearance.
The circular arrangement of sandbags reinforces the sensation of containment and vulnerability, while the opposing monitors create a silent confrontation between repetition and collapse. Through minimal visual elements and looping movement, the installation transforms a simple imperative phrase into an existential condition: learning to survive within a world shaped by fragility, climate anxiety, and constant transformation.
Technical Setup and Production: Rafael Núñez
