Glenn Stallcop Composer, Performer
Time to look down
“And so we find ourselves, all of us together, poised trembling on the edge of a change so massive that we have no way of gauging it. None of us knows where to look, but all of us know not to look down. . . . Our question is: what would happen if we looked down? Would it be as bad as we imagine? What might we see? Could it even be good for us?”
“We believe it is time to look down.”
Uncivilization: The Dark Mountain Manifesto
Paul Kingsnorth and Dougald Hine
When I created my album Uncivilization, I googled the title to see if there was something about it I didn’t know. I have nixed a number of titles doing this. I found that Uncivilization was also the title of a document (quoted above) which founded the Dark Mountain Project, a manifesto calling upon artists to craft visions of what the future will look like after civilization’s seemingly inevitable collapse. They have been publishing two anthology volumes per year of responses from writers, poets, visual artists and scholars since 2010.
I have been gradually working my way through this mountain of material ever since. There are many different types of articles, stories, fantasies, interviews, artwork, and poetry. Some of it is very poignant. There are some common threads, of course.
It seems a logical conclusion that climate change is caused in part because we have no longer cared about nor paid attention to the planet which spawned us and upon which we depend. Several articles deal with how industrialization and the privatization (and consolidation) of property have cut our close ties to the land. Some talk about the radical difference between how we and indigenous people see their surroundings. How one takes from the earth and the other cares for it. They discuss the sanctity of place. They talk about how a collapse will leave many people, myself included, unprepared physically and mentally for the task of caring for themselves. Some discuss the unexpected joys of physical labor and of mastering physical skills. It will be a different world with little time to adjust.
History is littered with the remains of collapsed civilizations. We have survived them all and still found a way to get by. Of course, none of them threatened the planet with mass extinction, but it seems likely we will collapse financially long before that fully materializes. It will certainly be a warmer, wetter, hungrier, and less organized world. Scars and poisons will remain. But maybe having to fend for ourselves will give us a little more respect for the planet which we need to survive. We can only hope.
One might expect an album of music centered around this topic to be rather ominous and tragic, full of harsh reality, death and sadness. This is not the case. The music is simple, patient, focused, and seems rather stoic yet remains compassionate. Surviving is not a frivolous subject, and as lemmings have learned, jumping off a cliff is easier. We will need each other. We will need resolve. Will it be good for us? I can’t answer that one.
TIME TO LOOK DOWN
“And so we find ourselves, all of us together, poised trembling on the edge of a change so massive that we have no way of gauging it. None of us knows where to look, but all of us know not to look down. . . . Our question is: what would happen if we looked down? Would it be as bad as we imagine? What might we see? Could it even be good for us?”
“We believe it is time to look down.”
Uncivilization: The Dark Mountain Manifesto
Paul Kingsnorth and Dougald Hine
When I created my album Uncivilization, I googled the title to see if there was something about it I didn’t know. I have nixed a number of titles doing this. I found that Uncivilization was also the title of a document (quoted above) which founded the Dark Mountain Project, a manifesto calling upon artists to craft visions of what the future will look like after civilization’s seemingly inevitable collapse. They have been publishing two anthology volumes per year of responses from writers, poets, visual artists and scholars since 2010.
I have been gradually working my way through this mountain of material ever since. There are many different types of articles, stories, fantasies, interviews, artwork, and poetry. Some of it is very poignant. There are some common threads, of course.
It seems a logical conclusion that climate change is caused in part because we have no longer cared about nor paid attention to the planet which spawned us and upon which we depend. Several articles deal with how industrialization and the privatization (and consolidation) of property have cut our close ties to the land. Some talk about the radical difference between how we and indigenous people see their surroundings. How one takes from the earth and the other cares for it. They discuss the sanctity of place. They talk about how a collapse will leave many people, myself included, unprepared physically and mentally for the task of caring for themselves. Some discuss the unexpected joys of physical labor and of mastering physical skills. It will be a different world with little time to adjust.
History is littered with the remains of collapsed civilizations. We have survived them all and still found a way to get by. Of course, none of them threatened the planet with mass extinction, but it seems likely we will collapse financially long before that fully materializes. It will certainly be a warmer, wetter, hungrier, and less organized world. Scars and poisons will remain. But maybe having to fend for ourselves will give us a little more respect for the planet which we need to survive. We can only hope.
One might expect an album of music centered around this topic to be rather ominous and tragic, full of harsh reality, death and sadness. This is not the case. The music is simple, patient, focused, and seems rather stoic yet remains compassionate. Surviving is not a frivolous subject, and as lemmings have learned, jumping off a cliff is easier. We will need each other. We will need resolve. Will it be good for us? I can’t answer that one.