Can the act of gliding also work as an act of writing? The sweeping movements of a glider aircraft through the sky already create circular traces in tracking applications—an asemic script that written at the intersection between wind, wing, and piloting skill. Can such gestures provide the basis for more complex acts of inscription, in which human and atmospheric agencies combine to parse the vital experience of flight into poetry?
Atmospheric Textualities is a project which, over the course of Spring-Summer 2023, will examine the potential for translating the winding routes of soaring gliders into poetic text using digital tracking technologies. As form of writing enabled through a negotiation with a multitude of airborne forces and volumes, this project will examine what it may tell us about human relationships with the more-than-human world.
This project was instigated at the generous invitation of writer Dr. J.R. Carpenter, as part of the research project Weather Reports Wind as Media, Model, Experience, whose members also include Prof. Ryan Bishop, Prof. Birgit Schneider, Prof. Jussi Parikka, and Maximilian Hepach. An interactive, creative-critical exploration of the project will eventually form part of a special issue of the journal Media+Environment.