During the drought, I learned a flower child tern of phrase. If it’s yellow, let it mellow. When it's brown, flush it down. My father and I would recite the motto back to one another — bonding over the shared acknowledgment of our own waste.
Drought Float, 2021, HD video, 00:13:46
Between 2006 and 2008, the Southern United States endured the worst regional drought in 100 years. Outside of Atlanta, Lake Lanier—a body of water named to honor the poet of the Confederacy— reached record lows, and the rumor of water depletion spun into hysteria. The Republican governor sprang into action and used the fear of water depletion to enact micro legislative changes throughout the state. The most fabulous of these responses came in November of 2007 when the city barred Atlanta Pride from its long established venue at Piedmont Park. It was determined that the event and its queer marchers would cause, too much damage to the cities grass. My multiyear project DROUGHT FLOAT intersects these various political, ecological, and queer forces, and stages historical renactments to better understand how strategies of suppression operate in the South today.
The human body consists of approximately 60% water; however, these reservoirs are specifically designed to flush, discharge, and release fluids in their efforts to maintain corporal order. Due to this loss, if we wish to survive, it is estimated that we must consume between two and three liters of water per day.
While water levels in the body remain above 56% our natural seepage goes unnoticed, but as we continue to lose water erratically, the unbalanced discharge triggers a familiar biological compulsion. Our bodies begin to dam. And the mouth dampens in correspondence with the growing cellular hysteria
While water levels in the body remain above 56% our natural seepage goes unnoticed, but as we continue to lose water erratically, the unbalanced discharge triggers a familiar biological compulsion. Our bodies begin to dam. And the mouth dampens in correspondence with the growing cellular hysteria
At 55% the brain begins to triage. By this point, our hearts are pounding quickly as they struggle to push hot thick sludge through shrunken veins. The kidneys have started to hoard precious lubrication, and our blood pressure has begun to plummet despite our rising temperature.
Receptors in the brain fluent in the dialects of organs translate these uneven forces into a language we can recognize. The result is an impulse that we know as thirst… But the limits of human perception should not overshadow the tricks of a microbiological trade.
Thirst is the governance of resources, and our craving, the meteorology of an ecosystem of blood and pressure.
Receptors in the brain fluent in the dialects of organs translate these uneven forces into a language we can recognize. The result is an impulse that we know as thirst… But the limits of human perception should not overshadow the tricks of a microbiological trade.
Thirst is the governance of resources, and our craving, the meteorology of an ecosystem of blood and pressure.
Deandre Riffle Improv,2021
4k Video 00:08:10
4k Video 00:08:10
