THE BREATH OF DRAGONS
Interdisciplinary dialogues on elemental forces
Between 9 and 18 September 2026, Selvagem is joining forces with the Institute of Legal and Philosophical Sciences at the Sorbonne University (ISJPS), with the partnership of AFIELD and KADIST, to carry out The Breath of Dragons, a continuation of the research work carried out by the Sorbonne University’s Chair in Earth's Habitability and Just Transitions da Sorbonne, com a coordenação da antropóloga e pensadora Nastassja Martin.
The events will take place in person in France – in Paris and in the French commune of La Grave, in the Alps – with a programme including discussion groups, film screenings and a research and creative residency with the community of La Grave.
Find out more about Nastassja's participation in Selvagem by clicking here or accessing the tabs below.
“Our aim is to work collectively towards the emergence of new responses, which involve different ways of thinking about our relationships with the beings and entities that make up our worlds and render our livelihoods habitable.”
– Nastassja Martin
– 9 to 11 September, at the Musée Départemental Albert Kahn – REGISTER HERE
• 9 September – From resources to elemental forces: reframing the climate issue
2.00 pm • Introduction by Nathalie Doury (Director of the Albert Kahn Museum)
2.30–3.30 pm • Opening lecture by Nastassja Martin (Anthropologist – ISJPS)
3.45–5.45 pm • Critical epistemology of habitability in the geosciences and human sciences – Round-table discussion with Maya Leroy (Head of Environmental Management, AgroParisTech), Jérôme Gaillardet (geochemist, Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris), Veronica Calvo (anthropologist, IEA Nantes) and Martine Drozdz (geographer, MFO Oxford), moderated by Nastassja Martin
• 10 September – Elementary ethnographies: anthropological and cosmopolitical perspectives on geophysical flows
10 am • Opening of the day by Nastassja Martin
10.15–11.15 am • Thinking with fire – Sasha Jurdant (PhD in Philosophy, University of Toulouse – Le Mirail)
11.30 am –12.30 pm • Nhe’ẽry – Where the spirits bathe – Carlos Papá (Filmmaker, coordinator of Arandu Porã, the Guarani Living School)
2.15 pm – 3.15 pm • The Maya, death and water: thresholds and liminality in Palenque-Lakamha – Alizé Lacoste Jeanson (anthropologist, UNAM, Mexico)
3.30 pm – 4.30 pm • Thinking about flows in wind energy: mobile labour and cosmologies of the wind – Gaëlla Loiseau (anthropologist, postdoctoral researcher at ISJPS-Sorbonne Paris 1)
4.45 pm – 5.45 pm • From soft earth to the Milky Way: feathered dinosaurs and giant emus in Australia – Barbara Glowczewski (anthropologist, emeritus researcher at the CNRS, LAS Paris)
• 11 September – Living memories: devising alternative museological and institutional approaches to address systemic crises
10 am • Opening of the day by Nastassja Martin
10.15 am–12 pm • Between living memories and collective amnesia: policies for the (re)animation of objects – Mario Ama Tuki (Director of Collections at the Pai Sebastian Englert Anthropological Museum), Katia Fersing (ethnologist, Director of the Millau and Grands Causses Museum)
1.45 pm–2.45 pm • The skeleton of images: vestiges of an anachronistic museum at the end of the world – Danilo Petrovitch (anthropologist, MUCAM), Miguel Caceres (Director of the Rio Seco Natural History Museum)
2:45 pm–3:45 pm • Engaging with the elemental forces: weaving together indigenous knowledge, science and the arts – Cristine Takuá (coordinator of the Living Schools indigenous movement) and Anna Dantes (director of the Selvagem Association and Dantes Editora)
4.00 pm–5.00 pm • The Albert Kahn gardens: inhabiting the Earth between wars – Gregory Quenet (environmental historian, University of Versailles-Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines)
5.30 pm • Closing remarks by Nastassja Martin
– 12 September, at the Cinéma Le Louxor – REGISTER HERE
• 12 September – For those who were devoured by the golden cities
7.00 pm–9.00 pm • Closing night of the ‘Earth’s Habitability’ gatherings
The Earth's Habitability and Just Transitions gatherings team up with KADIST and AFIELD for a closing night at the Le Louxor cinema (10th arrondissement of Paris), attended by Nastassja Martin and members of the Selvagem Association (Anna Dantes, Carlos Papá and Cristina Takuá). A selection of films from the KADIST and Selvagem Arrows, screened in dialogue with the artists, will continue the discussions and reflections initiated over the course of the previous three days. This will be followed by a get-together and celebration.
– 18 September, at the Villar d’Arène festival
From 13 to 18 September, a research and creative residency will take place at the Chancel refuge in the La Grave region, bringing together the guests from the meetings and the La Grave community for a series of activities centred on sharing, socialising and reflection.
On 18 September, at 5.00 pm, we will hold a public presentation of the work carried out at the refuge, in the main square of Villar d’Arène, as part of the commune’s heritage days and the opening of the Villar d’Arène festival.
CARRIED OUT BY:
INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERS:
PROGRAMME
Acesse aqui o programa do ciclo, disponível em português e francês, com todas as informações sobre os encontros e atividades.
MORE CONTRIBUTIONS BY NASTASSJA MARTIN TO SELVAGEM
– See also the playlist "Nastassja Martin on Selvagem“.
Ailton Krenak and Nastassja Martin talk about listening to the reactions of the elements as a way of undoing the extractivist experiences imposed by the world of commodities and of imagining futures with different forms of relationship, care and coexistence on the planet.
The talk by Nastassja Martin that gave rise to this chapter has also unfolded in the Selvagem notebook OVERFLOWS, available in Portuguese, French, English and Spanish.
Reflecting on the severing of ties between worlds and proposing ways to resume interrupted dialogues with elemental forces, Nastassja Martin explores how to rebuild relationships in which overflows – such as floods, ruptures and excesses – are not viewed merely as disasters, but as responses that require an attentive ear to the forms of knowledge that have never ceased to recognise and heed their voices.
• Visit to the Guarani Living School
Following the Living School House artistic residency and the Motherwater event, in October 2025, the artists and coordinators of the Living Schools indigenous movement travelled to the territory of the Guarani Living School for an immersion experience, where they spent days living together, engaging in dialogue, deepening their spiritual connection, and exchanging knowledge among the different peoples. Nastassja Martin was also present at that time, meeting the coordinators of the Living Schools and speaking further with the Selvagem team.
Nastassja Martin, Cristine Takuá (coordinator of the Living Schools movement) and Netë Huni Kuï (coordinator of the Huni Kuï Living School) at Arandu Porã, the Guarani Living School
In this second episode of the ‘Hammock Talk’ series, Ailton Krenak and Nastassja Martin meet at the home of Denise Milfont in Rio de Janeiro. Weaving threads of words, they discuss topics such as the separation between nature and culture, the power of orality, and the diversity of understandings regarding the boundaries of the living world.
Night and day. The continuous journey of intertwining worlds. The first conversation held as part of the ‘Dreams’ study cycle, which in 2022 brought together the knowledge of people, cultures and communities who place their trust in language and in the transformative power of dreams. The conversation is available with the original audio (Portuguese-French) or translated into Portuguese.
Between 2015 and 2020, Nastassja Martin lived on and off with Daria and her family, members of the Even people, near the River Icha on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the far east of Russia. The text in this section was provided to Selvagem in unpublished form for publication as part of the Dreams Cycle, in which Nastassja also took part, and was later published in her book À l’Est des rêves – réponses Even aux crises écosystémiques [East of Dreams – Even responses to ecosystem crises].