image: Meeting the Lough On Its Own Terms installation
 

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Gut Feeling
Ami Clarke; artists talk in conversation with curator Kirsten Cooke.
5-7pm Sat 21st March
rsvp here

Meeting The Lough On Its Own Terms exh: 20th Feb - 23rd May
kindly supported by Arts Council England

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The work offers a glimpse of what lies beneath the surface of Lough Neagh, overwhelmed by algae blooms summer of ’23, inviting you to Meet the Lough On Its Own Terms, as just one of many species living amongst the multitudes in the vulnerable eco-system of the Lough, vital to finding a more sustainable equilibrium.

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Algae blooms offer a symptom of the climate crisis that emphasises the interconnectedness of vulnerable ecosystems with human-made systems. Bringing together the multiple scales and temporalities of the lough, combining 4K drone footage and underwater filming, with microscopic video at a microbial scale, the installation seeks to encourage deeper reflection on how environmental neglect affects both democratic processes and public health as neoliberal policies entangle with algae blooms. The material emphasis on the nutrients in the lough, raises awareness, educates and empowers advocacy for more effective environmental regulations and democratic processes leading to establishing the Rights of Nature.

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The work draws upon a collective writing project and conversations over 2.5 years with Friends of the Earth NI and associates, druids, herbalists, campaigners, and eco-lawyers engaged with ancient Irish Brehon Law, to tell of the multiple stories running through the Lough from a decolonial, multi-species, eco-feminist perspective.

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Clarke and Cooke, an independent curator whose recent projects include ‘Aqueous Humours Fluid Ground’ published by Matt’s Gallery and The Poorhouse Reading Rooms (2025), that focuses upon artists’ responses to the concept of situated waters, will discuss the site specificity of the work at Lough Neagh, whilst drawing out the broader implications for numerous other sites across Ireland and the UK.

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Cooke’s engagement with the potential of considering ourselves ‘bodies of water’ (Astrida Neimanis) in ways that re-orientate our relationship with the planet, speaks to the porosity that Clarke points to in her focus on the microbial scale. Informed by evolutionary biologist Lynn Margulis’ research, who questioned the emphasis on ‘competition’ as the overwhelming evolutionary narrative, with a deeper understanding of collaborative processes as the organism emerges in synthesis with its environment. Humans were revealed to be ecologies in themselves: Holobionts, a consortia of human, and microbial life, that renders them 95% non-human DNA.

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The focus on the microbial scale holds the potential to lead to a paradigm shift in thinking; a gut feeling, even, as we start to understand our relationship to nature from a more de-centred perspective.

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Cooke previously staged Clarke’s performance ‘Error-Correction: an introduction to future diagrams’ at xero, kline and coma (2017) and the discussion will touch upon the posthuman research that brought Clarke’s practice to such a timely moment in 2023, where evolutionary biologist Lynn Margulis’ research on microbial life became indispensable.

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We will discuss the converging ideological world views that bring us to a state of Systems Collapse today, and how thinking in systems i.e. ‘ecological thinking’ is now vital for our very survival.

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