Nuclear Information Centre.
Sizewell Trees (2023).
NIC/NP/001Audio MP3 file or audio-visual MP4 file (Duration 2m 37s).
https://vimeo.com/826468665
Creaking trees, deep in conversation in the woods around Sizewell.
It seems there’s something in the wind
and clearly lots to talk about...
Some of the earliest infrastructural elements of the Sizewell C nuclear new-build project are the nature reserves and habitats situated both within and just outside the site boundary, which are being created as a form of ecological mitigation. In this strictly human endeavour, nature is literally engineered into the site development as a precursive offset to further interventions that will inevitably impact on the existing natural environment during the later site construction phase and subsequent operation.
Sizewell Trees was created in collaboration with local woodlands and the wind to consider a fictional conversation taking place between groups of existing trees adjoining the proposed Sizewell C site. Not understanding this intriguing exchange, we can only draw on our own imaginations as to what might be being said. The audio is overlayed with an aerial view of the existing Sizewell site and immediate surroundings which slowly dissolves into a closeup view of a currently fenced-off zone, where a sign informs us as to the location of some of the initial environmental changes.
There is an intentional ambiguity to this piece as it blurs both real and imaginary boundaries between human and non-human worlds within an unfolding nuclear narrative.
Sizewell Trees (audio only version) was aired on Noods Radio (29/04/2023) as part of the Broadcasting Intimacy Project in association with UWE Steet Corner Reading Rooms.
The audio-visual version of Sizewell Trees was screened most recently as part of the Fiction Machines symposium at Bath Spa University (20/07/2023).
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