Atlas of Extinction

No cheerful news – extinction seems imminent. There's no denying that our relationship with nature is at its most catastrophic point in history. But human society, too, is in overdrive, and, so, a world without humans might not be as far an apocalyptic scenario as we thought it would be. Atlas of Extinction investigates the ways in which we interact with and classify the world that surrounds us, urging us to reflect beyond a human-centric understanding of our environments and the different other beings that inhabit them. New or unseen creatures that defy our common labels speak of our society's limitations to dealing with differences and of our resistance and difficulty in accepting otherness. Post-human worlds, where animals reign supreme and fight for themselves or where nature has already taken over buildings, show us displays and chances for resistance beyond the damage and violation that the human race has already done. In between, throughout this selection of films there is the glimmer of a hope that if we understand to better commune with nature, there might still be time to if not undo than at least rebuild. (Dora Leu)