NADA New York 2022

Marina Zurkow and James Schmitz’s Does The River Flow Both Ways? explores an alternate, present-day Hudson River estuary in which happy social and biological ecosystems live in harmony; a place where humans can interact with the water in intimate ways and experience what is happening below its surface. The title questions whether such a techno-optimistic present is viable. In good faith, the animated, software-driven work imagines a world in which renewables, public transport, water shipment, sensual freedom, and multi-species ecologies can indeed coexist, even thrive, during a turbulent climactic period. The animated elements emerge primarily in response to algorithmic probability as well as real-time weather and tide data.