Desert

The Anthropocene Project. An Encyclopedia

Plastic bottles and bags mark the limits of civilization. When they are lost from sight, what remains is heat and wind, sand and stones. No rain. No more growth, the expansion of the desert. That which is stripped of life, a map of endless decay and forgetting. The beholder is transformed, with light, the sand and the air. Dehydrated, and breaking apart. The hydrological circle without hydro, unsuccessful hydraulics. Shrinking, melting, erosion. Change in form. Where are the limits of the body under the sun? Those of oxygen and space? Even the colors are three-dimensional: purple, yellow, gold, blue, transparent, white . . . black at night. Everything flows together and is lost. No horizon remains. Perception is lost. A different sense for beauty emerges. What is stripped of life, can be again. Or has long become: otherwise.